From Thomas Browne’s Religio Medici (Part 2, section 12 or pg.84 of my single volume Selected Writings from Univ. of Chicago Press):
There is surely a neerer apprehension of any thing that delights us in our dreames than in our waked senses; without this I were unhappy, for my awaked judgement discontents mee, ever whispering unto me, that I am from my friend, but my friendly dreames in the night requite me, and make me thinke I am within his armes. I thanke God for my happy dreames, as I doe for my good rest, for there is a satisfaction in them unto reasonable desires, and such as can be content with a fit of happinesse; and surely it is not a melancholy conceite to thinke we are all asleepe in this world, and that the conceits of this life are as meere dreames to those of the next, as the Phantasmes of the night, to the conceite of the day. There is an equall delusion in both, and the one doth but seeme to bee the embleme or picture of the other; wee are somewhat more than our selves in our sleepes, and the slumber of the body seemes to bee but the waking of the soule. It is the ligation of sense, but the liberty of reason, and our awaking conceptions doe not match the fancies of our sleepes.
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