another pretty lie, this time about sleep and demons

Maybe sleep is God's way of preventing us from becoming demons.

See, it's a well known fact (at least in China) that demons can only travel in straight lines. And if you couldn't sleep, well, then there'd never be any reason to stop. This occurs to me sometimes when I'm really enthusiastic about a project -- writing or painting -- that if only I didn't have to go to sleep, I could just keep going. I could pursue a thread until I found its very end.

And if I did that? Who knows what kind of demon I'd become. All sense of balance would go out the window. I would follow my obsession until I had become a grotesque parody of it's humble, mild-mannered origins.

If no one slept, we'd all be carried along by our passions without break, becoming more and more like whatever will-o'-the-wisp we're chasing. People would be just like themselves -- only more so. Frightening, right? Only divinely-imposed distraction saves us.

So, see? It's a very good thing that we go to sleep. Someone must be looking out for us.