THE LOGIC OF SLEEP-LEARNING: Page 16

atmosphere, words. We are educated by suggestion, to a great extent, and receive moral and religious instruction in the same way. In time we develop a large body of autosuggestions. It is because of our suggestibility that we respond to the arts, that we buy what we buy, responding to the advertiser's repetitions. Suggestibility in the voter becomes evident at the polls. Broad social movements and mob action could never occur if it were not for the fact that most human beings are highly suggestible. It is in a relaxed state—or any other state in which the reasoning function is less active, that we are most amenable to suggestion, and this fact appears to be responsible for the efficiency in learning that is claimed by adherents of the sleep-study school. Relaxation increases with sleep, and so the subconscious is even more easily reached by suggestion than it is during waking hours, and is taught more effectively. "Suggestion," says Professor Bechterev, "enters into the understanding by the back stairs, while logical persuasion knocks at the front door." Sleep-learning, then, since it is predicated on suggestion, avoids the necessity of waiting for the conscious mind to open the door for the desired information. It slips in more easily, unhindered, because the door to the subconscious is always open. During sleep, during periods of relaxation, during hypnosis, mental stress is at a minimum. Since learning is most easily absorbed under favorable emotional conditions, and since the mind is so receptive to suggestions under these conditions, sleep-learning reflects the benefits of many advantages not always possible during