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Note that Pasithei is the goddess of relaxation and rest, and so we understand why it is so very desirable to the god of sleep!
The god Ipnos according to the Ancient Greeks is the son of Night and Erebus. They imagined him young, beautiful, with wings on his shoulders, lulling the weary to sleep by sprinkling them with a branch soaked in the dew of oblivion, or by watering them with hypnotic juices from a horn, or simply by waving his wings.
The power of the god Sleep is very great. He can put all gods and all men to sleep. In fact, he even put to sleep the leader of the gods, Zeus, against his will, after pressure from the goddess Hera who wanted to influence the course of the Trojan War. Hera visits Hypnos in Lemnos where he lived. He addresses him as "anacta" (lord, king) of all the gods and men, to convince him, but Sleep thinks of messing with Zeus, because they had precedents from the past. He is persuaded to do so, but first Hera has sworn to marry him to one of the younger Graces, the sweet Pasithei, whom he so desired. Sleep and Hera set off together to find Zeus. Hera spreads "sweet love and desire" in the heart of Zeus and Sleep, transformed into a bird, puts him to sleep.
Note that Pasithei is the goddess of relaxation and rest, and so we understand why it is so very desirable to the god of sleep!
Ipnos (God of sleep) with his beloved Pasithei, they had children Oniris, who of course followed the family business! The Dream brothers are: Morpheus, Ikelos, Fobitor and Phantasos. Together they are called "Dreams" and they are the gods of dreams. They dwelt on the shores of the ocean, in the West, in a cave near the borders of Hades. The dreams, sent the dreams to the mortals, through two gates that were there. One gate was made of Horn, and with it they sent the true dreams (omens), while with the second, which was made of Ivory, they sent the false dreams.
Penelope says characteristically (Homer's Odyssey, T 559-566):
we have, O strangers, dreams of hollow dreams, with hollow words,
and not everything we dream about turns out right.
Two doors the light-flowered dreams always have
with horns on one side, with mother-of-pearl on the other
All the dreams that pass through the mother of pearl the sawdust,
They are lost and useless, and mortals are laughed at.
Take all the goodly horns that pass by,
they come true to the man who sees them
