Volume 299 Biographies 187: Divination

滑壽葛乾孫呂復倪維德周漢卿王履周顛張中張三丰袁珙子:忠徹戴思恭盛寅皇甫仲和仝寅吳傑附:許紳王綸淩雲附:李玉李時珍附:繆希雍周述學張正常附:劉淵然等

This chapter treats Hua Shou, Ge Gansun, Lü Fu, Ni Weide, Zhou Hanqing, Wang Lü, Zhou Dian, Zhang Zhong, Zhang Sanfeng, Yuan Gong and his son Zhongche, Dai Sigong, Sheng Yin, Huangfu Zhonghe, Tong Yin, and Wu Jie; with appended accounts of Xu Shen, Wang Lun, and Ling Yun; of Li Yu; of Li Shizhen and Miu Xiyong; and of Zhou Shuxue, Zhang Zhengchang, and Liu Yuanran, among others.

左氏載醫和、緩、梓慎、裨灶、史蘇之屬，甚詳且核。下逮巫祝，亦往往張其事以神之。論者謂之浮誇，似矣。而《史記》傳扁鵲、倉公，日者，龜策，至黃石、赤松、倉海君之流，近于神仙荒忽，亦備錄不遺。范蔚宗乃以方術名傳。夫藝人術士，匪能登乎道德之途。然前民利用，亦先聖之緒餘，其精者至通神明，參造化，詎曰小道可觀已乎！

The Zuo Commentary gives full and careful accounts of physicians and diviners such as He, Huan, Zi Shen, Pi Zao, and Shi Su. Even shamans and sacrificial officers tended to magnify such stories until they seemed miraculous. Later critics dismissed this as empty exaggeration, and with reason. Yet Sima Qian's Shiji still devotes full biographies to Bian Que and Chunyu Yi, to calendrical specialists and turtle-and-millet diviners, and even to figures bordering on the fabulous immortals—Master Yellow Stone, Master Red Pine, Lord Canghai of the Eastern Sea—leaving none of them out. Fan Ye in turn grouped such figures under the title 'Arts and Techniques.' Artisans and technical specialists, it is true, seldom reach the heights of moral philosophy. Still, the practical arts handed down from antiquity were heirlooms of the sages themselves; at their finest they could penetrate the numinous and align with the workings of Heaven and Earth—far more than trifles fit only for casual notice.

明初，周顛、張三丰之屬，蹤跡秘幻，莫可測識，而震動天子，要非妄誕取寵者所可幾。張中、袁珙，占驗奇中。夫事有非常理所能拘者，淺見鮮聞不足道也。醫與天文皆世業專官，亦本《周官》遺意。攻其術者，要必博極于古人之書，而會通其理，沈思獨詣，參以考驗，不為私智自用，乃足以名當世而為後學宗。今錄其最異者，作《方伎傳》。真人張氏，道家者流，而世蒙恩澤，其事蹟關當代典故，撮其大略附於篇。

In early Ming times Zhou Dian, Zhang Sanfeng, and their like moved in paths secret and uncanny, beyond ordinary reckoning, yet they shook the court—achievements no mere impostor currying favor could rival. Zhang Zhong and Yuan Gong scored astonishingly accurate hits in prognostication. Some events lie outside the grip of common logic; narrow experience has little to say about them. Medicine and astronomy were hereditary specialist posts, echoing the design of the Zhou ritual canon. To master either art required exhaustive study of antiquity's texts, a unified grasp of principle, solitary depth of thought, and testing by experience rather than private conceit—only then could one stand as a name in the age and a beacon for posterity. Here we record the most remarkable of them in this 'Treatise on Arts and Techniques.' Zhang Sanfeng, a Daoist adept who enjoyed imperial favor, is summarized here because his career belongs to the living history of the dynasty.

滑壽，字伯仁，先世襄城人，徙儀真，後又徙余姚。幼警敏好學，能詩。京口王居中，名醫也。壽從之學，授《素問》、《難經》。既卒業，請于師曰：「《素問》詳矣，多錯簡。愚將分藏象、經度等為十類，類抄而讀之。《難經》又本《素問》、《靈樞》，其間榮衛藏府與夫經絡腧穴，辨之博矣，而缺誤亦多。愚將本其義旨，注而讀之可乎？」居中躍然稱善。自是壽學日進。壽又參會張仲景、劉守真、李明之三家而會通之，所治疾無不中。既學針法于東平高洞陽，嘗言：「人身六脈雖皆有系屬，惟督任二經，則苞乎腹背，有專穴。諸經滿而溢者，此則受之，宜與十二經並論。」乃取《內經骨空》諸論及《靈樞篇》所述經脈，著《十四經發揮》三卷，通考隧穴六百四十有七。他如《讀傷寒論抄》、《診家樞要》、《痔瘺篇》又采諸書《本草》為《醫韻》，皆有功於世。晚自號攖寧生。江、浙間無不知攖寧生者。年七十余，容色如童孺，行步蹻捷，飲酒無算。天臺硃右摭其治疾神效者數十事，為作傳，故其著述益有稱於世。

Hua Shou, courtesy name Boren, came originally from Xiangcheng; his forebears relocated to Yizhen and then to Yuyao. As a boy he was quick-witted and studious, and wrote verse. Wang Juzhong of Jingkou was a renowned doctor. Hua Shou became his pupil and received instruction in the Suwen and Nanjing. After finishing his training he said to his master, 'The Suwen is comprehensive, yet many passages are corrupt or out of place. I plan to rearrange material on the viscera, channel measurements, and the like into ten topical groups and recopy them for study. The Nanjing itself derives from the Suwen and Lingshu; it treats nutrient and defensive qi, the organs, channels, and points with great breadth, yet it too is full of gaps and mistakes. May I annotate it according to its true intent and study it that way? His teacher leapt up and applauded the plan. From that day Hua Shou's mastery grew steadily. He also harmonized Zhang Zhongjing, Liu Shouzhen, and Li Gao into a single approach, and the diseases he treated invariably yielded. After learning acupuncture from Gao Dongyang of Dongping, he remarked, 'Though all six channel systems of the body are interconnected, only the Governing and Conception vessels wrap the trunk front and back and have their own dedicated points. When the other channels brim over, these two receive the overflow; they deserve to be treated on a par with the twelve regular channels. He drew on the 'Bone Void' treatises of the Neijing and the channel lore of the Lingshu to compose his Exposition of the Fourteen Channels in three juan, cataloguing 647 acupoints in all. His Reading Notes on the Shanghan lun, Essentials for Pulse Examiners, Treatise on Hemorrhoids and Fistulas, and Medical Rhymes compiled from pharmacological sources likewise served the age. In old age he took the sobriquet Master Yingning. From the lower Yangtze to Zhejiang, scarcely anyone failed to know Master Yingning. Past seventy he still had a child's complexion, a spry step, and a boundless capacity for wine. Zhu You of Tiantai gathered several dozen of his most striking cures into a biographical account, which helped his books win wider fame.

葛乾孫

Ge Gansun

葛乾孫，字可久，長洲人。父應雷，以醫名。時北方劉守真、張潔古之學未行于南。有李姓者，中州名醫，官吳下，與應雷談論，大駭歎，因授以張、劉書。自是江南有二家學。乾孫體貌魁碩，好擊刺戰陣法。後折節讀書，兼通陰陽、律曆、星命之術。屢試不偶，乃傳父業。然不肯為人治疾，或施之，輒著奇效，名與金華硃丹溪埒。富家女病四支痿痹，目瞪不能食，眾醫治罔效。乾孫命悉去房中香奩、流蘇之屬，掘地坎，置女其中。久之，女手足動，能出聲。投藥一丸，明日女自坎中出矣。蓋此女嗜香，脾為香氣所蝕，故得是症。其療病奇中如此。

Ge Gansun, courtesy name Kejiu, came from Changzhou. His father Ge Yinglei was a celebrated physician. In those days the northern schools of Liu Shouzhen and Zhang Jiegu had not yet reached the south. A celebrated doctor surnamed Li from the central plains, serving in Wu, debated medicine with Yinglei, marveled at his learning, and presented him with the works of Zhang Jiegu and Liu Shouzhen. Thus both northern schools took root in the lower Yangtze region. Gansun was tall and powerfully built, and delighted in fencing and military drill. Later he turned to serious study and mastered yin-yang doctrine, calendrical science, and horoscopy as well. After repeated failure in the civil examinations he took up his father's medical line. He seldom consented to treat patients, yet when he did his cures were startling, and his reputation matched Zhu Danxi of Jinhua. A wealthy household's daughter lay paralyzed in all four limbs, stared blankly, and could not eat; no doctor could help her. Gansun had every censer, perfume box, and hanging tassel removed from her room, dug a pit in the floor, and laid her in it. After some time her hands and feet stirred and she could speak. A single dose of his medicine followed, and the next day she climbed out of the pit herself. She had been addicted to incense; the spleen had been damaged by aromatic vapors, which produced the syndrome. His clinical successes were often as uncanny as this.

呂復，字元膺，鄞人。少孤貧，從師受經。後以母病求醫，遇名醫衢人鄭禮之，遂謹事之，因得其古先禁方及色脈藥論諸書，試輒有驗。乃盡購古今醫書，曉夜研究，自是出而行世，取效若神。其於《內經》、《素問》、《靈樞》、《本草》、《難經》、《傷寒論》、《脈經》、《脈訣》、《病原論》、《太始天元玉冊公誥》、《六微旨》、《五常政》、《玄珠密語》、《中藏經》、《聖濟經》等書，皆有辨論。前代名醫如扁鵲、倉公、華佗、張仲景至張子和、李東垣諸家，皆有評騭。所著有《內經或問》、《靈樞經脈箋》、《五色診奇眩》、《切脈樞要》、《運氣圖說》、《養生雜言》諸書甚眾。浦江戴良采其治效最著者數十事，為醫案。曆舉仙居、臨海教諭，台州教授，皆不就。

Lü Fu, courtesy name Yuanying, was from Yin county. Orphaned and poor in youth, he studied the classics under a teacher. When his mother fell ill he sought a physician, met the celebrated Quzhou doctor Zheng Lizhi, and became his devoted pupil, gaining access to ancient secret prescriptions and works on complexion, pulse, and drugs—every trial proved effective. He bought every medical book he could find, old or new, and studied night and day; when he began practice his results seemed miraculous. He wrote critical discussions on the Neijing, Suwen, Lingshu, Bencao, Nanjing, Shanghan lun, Maijing, Maijue, Bingyuan lun, and a host of other canonical medical texts. He also passed judgment on the great doctors of antiquity, from Bian Que and Chunyu Yi through Hua Tuo and Zhang Zhongjing down to Zhang Zihe and Li Dongyuan. His publications were voluminous: Inquiries into the Inner Canon, Commentary on the Channels of the Spiritual Pivot, Wondrous Dizziness in the Five-Color Diagnosis, Essentials of Pulse-Taking, Illustrated Explanation of Circulating Qi, Miscellaneous Sayings on Nourishing Life, and many more. Dai Liang of Pujiang collected several dozen of his most striking cures into a casebook. Repeated nominations to educational posts in Xianju, Linhai, and Taizhou he declined one and all.

倪維德

Ni Weide

倪維德，字仲賢，吳縣人。祖、父皆以醫顯。維德幼嗜學，已乃業醫，以《內經》為宗。病大觀以來，醫者率用裴宗元、陳師文《和劑局方》，故方新病多不合。乃求金人劉完素、張從正、李杲三家書讀之，出而治疾，無不立效。周萬戶子，八歲昏眊，不識饑飽寒暑，以土炭自塞其口。診之曰：「此慢脾風也。脾藏智，脾慢則智短。」以疏風助脾劑投之，即愈。顧顯卿右耳下生癭，大與首同，痛不可忍。診之曰：「此手足少陽經受邪也。」飲之藥，逾月愈。劉子正妻病氣厥，或哭或笑，人以為崇。診之曰：「兩手脈俱沉，胃脘必有所積，積則痛。」問之果然，以生熟水導之，吐痰涎數升愈。盛架閣妻左右肩臂奇癢，延及頭面，不可禁，灼之以艾，則暫止。診之曰：「左脈沉，右脈浮且盛，此滋味過盛所致也。」投以劑，旋愈。林仲實以勞得熱疾，熱隨日出入為進退，暄盛則增劇，夜涼及雨則否，如是者二年。診之曰：「此七情內傷，陽氣不升，陰火漸熾。故溫則進，涼則退。」投以東垣內傷之劑，亦立愈。他所療治，多類此。常言：「劉、張二氏多主攻，李氏惟調護中氣主補，蓋隨時推移，不得不然。」故其主方不執一說。常患眼科雜出方論，無全書，著《元機啟微》，又校訂《東垣試效方》，並刊行於世。洪武十年卒，年七十五。

Ni Weide, courtesy name Zhongxian, was from Wu county. Both his grandfather and father were eminent physicians. Weide loved scholarship as a boy, then turned to medicine with the Neijing as his foundation. He lamented that since the Daguan era doctors had relied chiefly on Pei Zongyuan and Chen Shiwen's Bureau formulary, which often failed to fit new disorders. He studied Liu Wansu, Zhang Congzheng, and Li Gao, and once in practice scarcely a case failed to respond immediately. The eight-year-old son of Zhou the household head was dull-eyed, insensible to hunger, cold, or heat, and stuffed charcoal into his mouth. Weide diagnosed him, saying, 'This is chronic spleen wind. The spleen governs intelligence; when the spleen is sluggish, wit fails. He prescribed a formula to dispel wind and strengthen the spleen, and the child recovered immediately. Gu Xianqing grew a goiter beneath his right ear as large as his head, with unbearable pain. Weide said, 'The hand and foot Shaoyang channels have been invaded by pathogenic qi. After a course of medicine he was healed within a month. Liu Zizheng's wife suffered qi syncope, alternating between weeping and laughter; neighbors blamed evil spirits. Both pulses were deep, he said: 'There must be stagnation in the epigastrium; stagnation causes pain. Questioning confirmed it; he gave a purgative draught, she brought up several pints of phlegm, and recovered. Clerk Sheng's wife suffered maddening itch on both shoulders and arms spreading to head and face; moxibustion brought only brief relief. The left pulse was deep, the right floating and full: 'Too rich a diet,' he said. One prescription cured her at once. Lin Zhongshi developed a fever from overstrain that waxed and waned with the sun—worse in warm daylight, better in cool nights and rain—for two years. Weide diagnosed internal damage from emotional excess: yang qi failed to rise while yin fire smoldered ever hotter. Hence heat surged in warmth and subsided in coolness. He prescribed Li Gao's formulas for internal injury, and the patient recovered immediately. Most of his other cures followed the same pattern. He often remarked, 'Liu and Zhang chiefly purge; Li Gao nourishes the middle qi—each method suits its age, and none can be dismissed. His own prescriptions therefore followed no single school blindly. Lamenting the lack of a comprehensive ophthalmology text, he wrote The Origin of the Mysterious Mechanism, collated Li Gao's Trial Formulas, and published both. He died in 1377 at the age of seventy-five.

周漢卿

Zhou Hanqing

周漢卿，松陽人。醫兼內外科，針尤神。鄉人蔣仲良，左目為馬所踶，睛突出如桃。他醫謂系絡已損不可治。漢卿封以神膏，越三日復故。華州陳明遠瞽十年。漢卿視之，曰：「可針也。」為翻睛刮翳，焱然辨五色。武城人病胃痛，奮擲乞死。漢卿納藥於鼻，俄噴赤蟲寸許，口眼悉具，痛旋止。馬氏婦有娠，十四月不產，尪且黑。漢卿曰：「此中蠱，非娠也。」下之，有物如金魚，病良已。永康人腹疾，佝僂行。漢卿解衣視之，氣沖起腹間者二，其大如臂。刺其一，砉然鳴，又刺其一亦如之，加以按摩，疾遂愈。長山徐嫗癇疾，手足顫掉，裸而走，或歌或笑。漢卿刺其十指端，出血而痊。錢塘王氏女生瘰鬁，環頭及腑，凡十九竅。竅破白沈出，將死矣。漢卿為剔竅母深二寸，其餘烙以火，數日結痂愈。山陰楊翁項有疣如瓜大，醉僕階下，潰血不能止。疣潰者必死。漢卿以藥糝其穴，血即止。義烏陳氏子腹有塊，捫之如罌。漢卿曰：「此腸癰也。」用大針灼而刺之，入三寸許，膿隨針迸出有聲，愈。諸暨黃生背曲，須杖行。他醫皆以風治之，漢卿曰：「血澀也。」刺兩足昆侖穴，頃之投杖去。其捷效如此。

Zhou Hanqing came from Songyang. He practiced internal and external medicine alike; in acupuncture he was especially uncanny. His townsman Jiang Zhongliang had his left eye kicked out by a horse until the globe bulged like a peach. Other doctors declared the optic threads ruined and beyond cure. Hanqing applied a miraculous ointment; within three days the eye was restored. Chen Mingyuan of Huazhou had been blind ten years. Hanqing examined him and said, 'Acupuncture can help. He reversed the eyelid, scraped away the opacity, and in a flash the patient could distinguish all five colors. A man of Wucheng suffered gastric agony so violent he thrashed and begged for death. Hanqing administered medicine through the nose; the man promptly vomited a red worm an inch long, complete with mouth and eyes, and the pain ceased. A Mrs. Ma had been pregnant fourteen months without delivering, and had grown emaciated and sallow. Hanqing said, 'This is internal gu poisoning, not pregnancy. After he gave a downward-expelling remedy, the patient passed something resembling a goldfish, and the sickness promptly cleared. A Yongkang man had a belly ailment that left him bent double as he walked. Hanqing had him undress for examination and found two swollen qi masses in the abdomen, each the size of a forearm. He punctured one, which popped with a sharp sound; he did the same to the other, followed by massage, and the patient recovered. Old Mrs. Xu of Changshan suffered from epilepsy—her limbs shook violently, she ran about naked, and would break into song or laughter. Hanqing pricked the tips of all ten fingers to draw blood, and she was healed. A young woman of the Wang clan in Qiantang had scrofulous sores ringed around her head and chest, nineteen openings in total. The sores ruptured and discharged white pus; she was on the verge of dying. Hanqing cut away the primary fistula two inches deep, cauterized the remaining openings, and within days the wounds scabbed over and healed. Old Yang of Shanyin bore a melon-sized wart on his neck; while drunk he tumbled down the steps, the wart ruptured, and the bleeding would not cease. A ruptured wart was held to be a death sentence. Hanqing packed the wound with medicated powder, and the blood immediately stanched. A young man of the Chen clan in Yiwu had an abdominal mass that felt like a pot under the hand. Hanqing diagnosed it: 'This is an abscess of the intestine. He took a large needle, cauterized it, and drove it in some three inches; pus gushed out with a pop along the needle, and the patient was cured. A Zhuji youth named Huang was hunchbacked and could only get about with a walking stick. Every other doctor treated it as a wind disorder, but Hanqing said, 'The blood is congealed. He needled the Kunlun points on both feet, and before long the man threw down his cane and walked off unaided. Such were the rapid cures he achieved.

王履，字安道，昆山人。學醫于金華硃彥修，盡得其術。嘗謂張仲景《傷寒論》為諸家祖，後人不能出其範圍。且《素問》雲「傷寒為病熱」，言常不言變，至仲景始分寒熱，然義猶未盡。乃備常與變，作《傷寒立法考》。又謂《陽明篇》無目痛，《少陰篇》言胸背滿不言痛，《太陰篇》無嗌乾，《厥陰篇》無囊縮，必有脫簡。乃取三百九十七法，去其重者二百三十八條，復增益之，仍為三百九十七法。極論內外傷經旨異同，並《中風》、《中暑辨》，名曰《溯洄集》，凡二十一篇。又著《百病鉤玄》二十卷，《醫韻統》一百卷，醫家宗之。履工詩文，兼善繪事。嘗游華山絕頂，作圖四十幅，記四篇，詩一百五十首，為時所稱。

Wang Lü, courtesy name Andao, came from Kunshan. He apprenticed in medicine to Zhu Yanxiu of Jinhua and absorbed his entire method. He held that Zhang Zhongjing's Treatise on Cold Damage stood as the fountainhead of medical tradition, beyond which later physicians never ventured. The Plain Questions declares that cold damage manifests as heat—addressing the norm, not the exception—and only Zhongjing began to separate cold from heat patterns, though even his analysis left gaps. He therefore treated both standard presentations and exceptional cases in his Investigative Study on the Legislation of Cold Damage. He also argued that the Yangming chapter omits eye pain, the Shaoyin chapter mentions chest and back distension but not pain, the Taiyin chapter lacks sore throat, and the Jueyin chapter says nothing of scrotal shrinkage—clear signs of missing text. Starting from the 397 prescriptions, he eliminated 238 redundancies, added new ones, and arrived again at 397 formulas. He wrote at length on the parallels and divergences between internal and external injury, along with Discriminating Wind Stroke and Summer Heat, collected as the Upstream Return in twenty-one treatises. He further produced Hooking the Profound of the Hundred Diseases in twenty juan and the Compendium of Medical Rhymes in one hundred juan, works that the medical world took as authoritative. Wang Lü was accomplished in belles-lettres and equally gifted as a painter. He once climbed to the very peak of Mount Hua, where he painted forty scenes, wrote four travel essays, and composed 150 poems—all widely admired in his day.

自滑壽以下五人，皆生於元，至明初始卒。

From Hua Shou through these five figures, each was born under the Yuan and lived only into the opening years of the Ming.

周顛，建昌人，無名字。年十四，得狂疾，走南昌市中乞食，語言無恒，皆呼之曰顛。及長，有異狀，數謁長官，曰「告太平」。時天下甯謐，人莫測也。後南昌為陳友諒所據，顛避去。太祖克南昌，顛謁道左。洎還金陵，顛亦隨至。一日，駕出，顛來謁。問「何為」，曰「告太平」。自是屢以告。太祖厭之，命覆以巨缸，積薪煆之。薪盡啟視，則無恙，頂上出微汗而已。太祖異之，命寄食蔣山僧寺。已而僧來訴，顛與沙彌爭飯，怒而不食且半月。太祖往視顛，顛無饑色。乃賜盛饌，食已閉空室中，絕其粒一月，比往視，如故。諸將士爭進酒饌，茹而吐之，太祖與共食則不吐。太祖將征友諒，問曰：「此行可乎？」對曰：「可。」曰：「彼已稱帝，克之不亦難乎？」顛仰首視天，正容曰：「天上無他座。」太祖攜之行，舟次安慶，無風，遣使問之，曰：「行則有風。」遂命牽舟進，須臾風大作，直抵小孤。太祖慮其妄言惑軍心，使人守之。至馬當，見江豚戲水，歎曰：「水怪見，損人多。」守者以告。太祖惡之，投諸江。師次湖口，顛復來，且乞食。太祖與之食，食已，即整衣作遠行狀，遂辭去。友諒既平，太祖遣使往廬山求之，不得，疑其仙去。洪武中，帝親撰《周顛仙傳》，紀其事。

Zhou Dian came from Jianchang and bore no personal name. At fourteen he fell into madness, wandered Nanchang's markets begging for food, and rambled incoherently—everyone called him 'Mad Zhou.' As an adult he displayed uncanny behavior, repeatedly visiting magistrates to proclaim, 'Peace is at hand.' The empire was then at peace, and no one could make sense of his words. When Chen Youliang seized Nanchang, Dian left the city. After the Founding Emperor captured Nanchang, Dian appeared along the road to pay his respects. When the emperor returned to Jinling, Dian came along too. One day, as the emperor's procession departed, Dian presented himself again. When asked his business, he replied, 'I bring tidings of peace.' Thereafter he made the same proclamation again and again. The Founding Emperor, exasperated, had him sealed under an enormous cauldron and set ablaze with stacked firewood. When the fire burned out and they lifted the cauldron, he was untouched save for a light sweat on his head. Astonished, the emperor had him housed and provisioned at a monastery on Mount Jiang. Soon the monks reported that Dian had fought with a novice over a meal and, in a fury, had gone without food for nearly two weeks. The emperor visited him in person, yet Dian showed no trace of starvation. The emperor sent a sumptuous meal; after Dian ate, he was locked in a bare room and denied all food for a month—yet when the emperor looked in, he was unchanged. Officers competed to bring him delicacies, which he would eat and promptly spit out—but food shared with the emperor he kept down. As the emperor prepared to march against Chen Youliang, he asked, 'Should I undertake this campaign? Dian answered, 'You may go.' The emperor pressed him: 'He has already crowned himself emperor—will defeating him not be hard?' Dian lifted his eyes to heaven and said gravely, 'There is no other seat in the sky.' The emperor brought him on the expedition; at Anqing the fleet lay becalmed, and when a messenger asked Dian, he said, 'Set out and the wind will come.' The emperor commanded the fleet to advance under tow; moments later a gale sprang up and bore them directly to Xiaogu. Fearing his wild pronouncements might shake troop morale, the emperor posted guards over him. At Madang he watched porpoises leaping in the river and lamented, 'Water demons have shown themselves—many men will die. His guards relayed the remark to the emperor. Enraged, the emperor ordered him cast into the Yangtze. When the force paused at Hukou, Dian reappeared and asked for something to eat. The emperor fed him; after the meal Dian adjusted his robes as though setting out on a distant journey and departed. Once Chen Youliang was defeated, the emperor dispatched messengers to Mount Lu in search of him, but he was nowhere to be found, and the court assumed he had vanished into immortality. During the Hongwu era the emperor himself wrote the Biography of the Immortal Zhou Dian to commemorate these affairs.

張中，字景華，臨川人。少應進士舉不第，遂放情山水。遇異人，授數學，談禍福，多奇中。太祖下南昌，以鄧愈薦召至，賜坐。問曰：「予下豫章，兵不血刃，此邦之人其少息乎？」對曰：「未也。旦夕此地當流血，廬舍毀且盡，鐵柱觀亦僅存一殿耳。」未幾，指揮康泰反，如其言。尋又言國中大臣有變，宜豫防。至秋，平章邵榮、參政趙繼祖伏甲北門為亂，事覺伏誅。陳友諒圍南昌三月，太祖伐之，召問之。曰：「五十日當大勝，亥子之日獲其渠帥。」帝命從行，舟次孤山，無風不能進。乃以洞玄法祭之，風大作，遂達鄱陽。大戰湖中，常遇春孤舟深入，敵舟圍之數重，眾憂之。曰：「無憂，亥時當自出。」已而果然。連戰大勝，友諒中流矢死，降其眾五萬。自啟行至受降，適五十日。始南昌被圍，帝問「何日當解」，曰「七月丙戌」。報至，乃乙酉，蓋術官算曆，是月差一日，實在丙戍也。其占驗奇中，多若此。為人狷介寡合。與之言，稍涉倫理，輒亂以他語，類佯狂玩世者。嘗好戴鐵冠，人稱為鐵冠子雲。

Zhang Zhong, courtesy name Jinghua, came from Linchuan. As a young man he sat for the jinshi examination without success and thereafter abandoned himself to wanderings among peaks and streams. He encountered a strange adept who instructed him in divinatory calculation, and his predictions of weal and woe proved uncannily accurate. After the emperor captured Nanchang, Deng Yu recommended him; he was called to court and offered a chair. The emperor inquired, 'I seized Yuzhang without drawing swords—will its people at last know some respite? Zhong answered, 'Not yet. Within days blood will run here, dwellings will be razed to the ground, and of the Iron Pillar Abbey only a single hall will survive.' Soon afterward Commander Kang Tai rose in revolt, precisely as he had foretold. He soon warned again that high officials within the court would rebel and that the emperor should guard against it beforehand. That autumn Chief Administrator Shao Rong and Vice Administrator Zhao Jizu hid troops at the North Gate to launch a coup; the conspiracy was exposed and both were put to death. During Chen Youliang's three-month siege of Nanchang, the emperor led a relief force and called Zhong for counsel. Zhong declared, 'Within fifty days you will win a decisive victory, and on a day of hai or zi you will take their chieftain. The emperor bade him come along; at Gushan the fleet lay windless and could not proceed. Zhong performed a Taoist wind-summoning ritual, a fierce gale rose, and the fleet reached Lake Poyang. During the great lake battle Chang Yuchun drove a single boat deep into enemy lines and was ringed by hostile ships; the army grew fearful. Zhong said, 'Do not fret—by the hai hour he will break free of his own accord. And so it proved. Battle after battle went the emperor's way; Chen Youliang took an arrow and died, and fifty thousand of his men submitted. From the day the campaign began to the day of surrender, precisely fifty days had passed. At the outset of the siege the emperor had asked when Nanchang would be relieved; Zhong named the seventh month's bingxu day. Word came on yiyou, but the court astronomers' calendar was a day short that month—the true date was bingxu after all. Time and again his prophecies landed with this kind of eerie precision. By nature he was rigid, aloof, and slow to make friends. Engage him on ethics even briefly and he would deflect with unrelated chatter, as though playing the madman to scorn conventional society. He habitually wore an iron cap, earning the nickname Iron-Crown Master Yun.

張三丰

Zhang Sanfeng

張三丰，遼東懿州人，名全一，一名君寶，三丰其號也。以其不飾邊幅，又號張邋遢。頎而偉，龜形鶴背，大耳圓目，須髯如戟。寒暑惟一衲一蓑，所啖，升鬥輒盡，或數日一食，或數月不食。盡經目不忘，遊處無恒，或云能一日千里。善嬉諧，旁若無人。嘗游武當諸岩壑，語人曰：「此山異日必大興。」時五龍、南岩、紫霄俱毀於兵，三丰與其徒去荊榛，辟瓦礫，創草廬居之，已而舍去。

Zhang Sanfeng, native of Yizhou in Liaodong, was born Quanyi and also known as Junbao; Sanfeng was his sobriquet. Careless of dress and grooming, he was also called Zhang the Slob. Lofty in stature and broad of frame, he had a tortoise's build and a crane's carriage, large ears, round eyes, and a bristling beard like crossed halberds. Summer or winter he wore but one patched robe and a straw cape; a bowl of grain vanished in a single sitting, yet he might eat only once in days or abstain from food for months on end. Books passed before his eyes once and stayed in memory; he wandered without a fixed home, and rumor held he could cover a thousand li in a single day. He loved witty talk and merry pranks, utterly heedless of onlookers. Wandering Wudang's peaks and gorges, he declared to those around him, 'This mountain will one day rise to great prominence. The Wulong, Nanyan, and Zixiao shrines had been ruined in war; Sanfeng and his disciples hacked through thorn scrub, cleared rubble, and erected thatched shelters before moving on.

太祖故聞其名，洪武二十四年遣使覓之，不得。後居寶雞之金台觀。一日自言當死，留頌而逝，縣人共棺殮之。及葬，聞棺內有聲，啟視則復活。乃遊四川，見蜀獻王。復入武當，曆襄、漢，蹤跡益奇幻。永樂中，成祖遣給事中胡濙偕內侍硃祥齎璽書香幣往訪，遍曆荒徼，積數年不遇。乃命工部侍郎郭璡、隆平侯張信等，督丁夫三十余萬人，大營武當宮觀，費以百萬計。既成，賜名太和太嶽山，設官鑄印以守，竟符三丰言。

The Founding Emperor had known his reputation for years; in Hongwu 24 he dispatched messengers to locate him, but without success. He later made his home at Baoji's Golden Terrace Abbey. One day he declared his death was near, composed a parting hymn, and expired; the townspeople together prepared his coffin and burial rites. During the funeral sounds came from inside the coffin; when they lifted the lid, he was alive again. He then journeyed into Sichuan and was received by the Prince of Xian of Shu. Returning to Wudang, he ranged through the Xiang and Han regions, and reports of his wanderings grew stranger still. During Yongle, the Yongle Emperor dispatched Supervising Secretary Hu Ying and the eunuch Zhu Xiang with an imperial letter and ritual offerings to find him. They combed remote borderlands for years and never caught sight of him. He then put Vice Minister of Works Guo Jin, Marquis of Longping Zhang Xin, and others in charge of over three hundred thousand laborers to raise a vast complex of Wudang shrines and monasteries, at a cost running into millions. Once the work stood complete, the peak was renamed Mount Taihe Taiyue, with appointed custodians and official seals to oversee it—exactly as Sanfeng had foretold.

或言三丰金時人，元初與劉秉忠同師，後學道于鹿邑之太清宮，然皆不可考。天順三年，英宗賜誥，贈為通微顯化真人，終莫測其存亡也。

Tradition holds that Sanfeng lived in Jin times, that in early Yuan he shared a teacher with Liu Bingzhong and later pursued the Way at Luyi's Taiqing Palace; yet none of it can be confirmed. In Tianshun 3, Emperor Yingzong granted him an edict of honor and posthumously ennobled him as the Perfected Man of Penetrating Subtlety and Manifest Transformation—yet to the last no one could say whether he still lived.

袁珙，字廷玉，鄞人。高祖鏞，宋季舉進士。元兵至，不屈，舉家十七人皆死。父士元，翰林檢閱官。珙生有異稟，好學能詩。嘗遊海外洛伽山，遇異僧別古崖，授以相人術。先仰視皎日，目盡眩，布赤黑豆暗室中，辨之，又懸五色縷窗外，映月別其色，皆無訛，然後相人。其法以夜中燃兩炬視人形狀氣色，而參以所生年月，百無一謬。

Yuan Gong, styled Tingyu, came from Yin. His great-grandfather Yong earned the jinshi degree in the closing years of the Song. When the Yuan armies came he refused to yield, and all seventeen in his household perished. His father Shiyuan served as a Hanlin proofreader. Gong was gifted from birth, devoted to study, and wrote verse with ease. He once voyaged to Luojia Mountain overseas and there encountered the strange monk Bie Guya, who instructed him in physiognomy. He trained by staring at the bright sun until his sight swam, then sorting red and black beans in a dark room; he hung colored threads at the window and, by moonlight, named each hue without mistake. Only after such drills would he read a face. By night he lit twin torches, studied a man's shape and complexion, and weighed these against his birth date; his judgments missed scarcely once in a hundred.

珙在元時已有名，所相士大夫數十百，其於死生禍福，遲速大小，並刻時日，無不奇中。南台大夫普化帖木兒，由閩海道見珙。珙曰：「公神氣嚴肅，舉動風生，大貴驗也。但印堂司空有赤氣，到官一百十四日當奪印。然守正秉忠，名垂後世，願自勉。」普署台事於越，果為張士誠逼取印綬，抗節死。見江西憲副程徐曰：「君帝座上黃紫再見，千日內有二美除。但冷笑無情，非忠節相也。」徐於一年後拜兵部侍郎，擢尚書。又二年降於明，為吏部侍郎。嘗相陶凱曰：「君五嶽朝揖而氣色未開，五星分明而光澤未見，宜藏器待時。不十年以文進，為異代臣，官二品，其在荊、揚間乎！」凱後為禮部尚書、湖廣行省參政。其精類如此。洪武中，遇姚廣孝於嵩山寺，謂之曰：「公，劉秉忠之儔也，幸自愛。」後廣孝薦于燕王，召至北平。王雜衛士類己者九人，操弓矢，飲肆中。珙一見即前跪曰：「殿下何輕身至此。」九人者笑其謬，珙言益切。王乃起去，召珙宮中，諦視曰：「龍行虎步，日角插天，太平天子也。年四十，須過臍，即登大寶矣。」已見籓邸諸校卒，皆許以公侯將帥。王慮語泄，遣之還。及即位，召拜太常寺丞，賜冠服、鞍馬、文綺、寶鈔及居第。帝將建東宮，而意有所屬，故久不決。珙相仁宗曰：「天子也。」相宣宗曰：「萬歲天子。」儲位乃定。

Already renowned under the Yuan, he read the faces of scores upon scores of literati. Life, death, rise, fall, timing, and scale—he often pinned each to a date, and his uncanny hits never failed. Puhua Temur, Commissioner of the Southern Censorate, sought Gong out along the Minhai route. Gong told him, 'Your air is commanding and your step sets the air moving—marks of the highest rank. Yet red flush shows at your forehead centers; a hundred and fourteen days after you take your post, your seal will be wrested away. Stand firm in integrity, though, and your name will outlive you. See that you do not fail yourself. Puhua took up his post in Yue; Zhang Shicheng indeed seized his seal and sash, and he died refusing to submit. Reading Cheng Xu, Vice Commissioner of Jiangxi Surveillance, he said, 'Imperial yellow and purple will touch your brow twice; within a thousand days two splendid promotions await you. Yet that cold, mirthless smile marks a man not made for steadfast loyalty. Within a year Xu became Vice Minister of War, then rose to Minister. Two years after that he defected to Ming and took office as Vice Minister of Personnel. Reading Tao Kai, he said, 'Your features show the five peaks bowing in tribute, but your color has not yet ripened; the five stars stand clear, yet their light is still hidden. Bide your time and keep your gifts in reserve. Before ten years pass you will rise by literary talent, serve a new dynasty at second rank—likely somewhere between Jing and Yang! Kai later became Minister of Rites and Administrative Commissioner of Huguang. Such was the uncanny accuracy of his art. During Hongwu he encountered Yao Guangxiao at Songshan Temple and said, 'You stand in Liu Bingzhong's league; guard your worth well. Guangxiao later commended him to the Prince of Yan, who had him brought to Beiping. The prince hid among nine guardsmen dressed like himself, bows in hand, drinking in a public house. Gong took one look, stepped forward, knelt, and cried, 'Your Highness—why risk yourself here? The nine companions mocked him as a fool, yet Gong pressed his plea all the harder. The prince rose and withdrew, then summoned Gong within and studied him closely. 'You walk like a dragon and stride like a tiger; your brow bears the sun-horn reaching skyward—you are destined to rule a peaceful age. At forty your beard will reach past your navel—and then you will take the throne. He had already read the prince's guards and garrison men and promised each of them noble or command rank. Fearing the prophecy might spread, the prince sent him home. Once enthroned, the emperor summoned Gong, made him Vice Director of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices, and showered him with court dress, horse and saddle, brocades, banknotes, and a house. The emperor meant to name an heir apparent, but his preference lay elsewhere, and the choice dragged on. Reading the future Renzong's face, Gong declared, 'A true emperor. Reading the future Xuanzong, he said, 'An emperor who will reign ten thousand years.' With that the succession was settled.

珙相人即知其心術善惡。人不畏義，而畏禍患，往往因其不善導之於善，從而改行者甚多。為人孝友端厚，待族黨有恩。所居鄞城西，繞舍種柳，自號柳莊居士，有《柳莊集》。永樂八年卒，年七十有六。賜祭葬，贈太常少卿。

A single reading told Gong whether a man's inner mind ran good or wicked. Men fear misfortune more than they fear virtue; Gong often turned their vices back toward the good by warning of what awaited them, and many mended their ways. He was filial and cordial, steady and warm-hearted, and generous to kin and neighbors. He lived west of Yin city, ringed his home with willows, took the sobriquet Master of Willow Lodge, and left a collection known as the Willow Lodge Writings. He died in Yongle 8, at seventy-six. The throne granted him state rites of burial and posthumously raised him to Vice Director of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices.

子忠徹

His son was Zhongche.

子忠徹，字靜思。幼傳父術。從父謁燕王，王宴北平諸文武，使忠徹相之。謂都督宋忠面方耳大，身短氣浮，布政使張昺面方五小，行步如蛇，都指揮謝貴擁腫蚤肥而氣短，都督耿瓛顴骨插鬢，色如飛火，僉都御史景清身短聲雄，於法皆當刑死。王大喜，起兵意益決。及為帝，即召授鴻臚寺序班，賜齎甚厚。遷尚寶寺丞，已，改中書舍人，扈駕北巡。駕旋，仁宗監國，為讒言所中，帝怒，榜午門，凡東宮所處分事，悉不行。太子憂懼成疾，帝命蹇義、金忠偕忠徹視之。還奏，東宮面色青藍，驚憂象也，收午門榜可愈。帝從之，太子疾果已。帝嘗屏左右，密問武臣硃福、硃能、張輔、李遠、柳升、陳懋、薛祿，文臣姚廣孝、夏原吉、蹇義及金忠、呂震、方賓、吳中、李慶等禍福，後皆驗。九載秩滿，復為尚寶司丞，進少卿。

Zhongche, Gong's son, styled Jingsi. From boyhood he mastered his father's craft. He accompanied his father to the Prince of Yan's court. At a banquet for Beiping's civil and military officers, the prince bade Zhongche read them. Of Commissioner Song Zhong he said the square face and large ears, short frame and shallow breath marked a man doomed to the block. Zhang Bing's square face with pinched features and serpentine gait, Xie Gui's swollen bulk and gasping breath, Geng Yan's jutting cheekbones and fiery flush, Jing Qing's squat frame and thunderous voice—all, by physiognomic law, were faces of men fated for execution. The prince was delighted, and his decision to rebel hardened. Once enthroned he immediately summoned Zhongche, made him Registrar of the Court of Imperial Reception, and heaped rewards upon him. He rose to Vice Director of the Office of Imperial Seals, then became Drafting Secretary and joined the emperor's northern progress. On the emperor's return, the crown prince was regent. Malicious rumors poisoned the emperor's mind; enraged, he posted a public rebuke at the Meridian Gate and voided every order the Eastern Palace had issued. The heir, sick with fear, took to his bed; the emperor sent Jian Yi and Jin Zhong with Zhongche to look in on him. They reported back that the heir's face showed the blue-green cast of terror and grief, and that removing the Meridian Gate placard would cure him. The emperor complied, and the heir's sickness lifted. On another occasion the emperor sent his attendants away and privately asked Zhongche to read the fates of generals Zhu Fu, Zhu Neng, Zhang Fu, Li Yuan, Liu Sheng, Chen Mao, and Xue Lu, and of ministers Yao Guangxiao, Xia Yuanji, Jian Yi, Jin Zhong, Lü Zhen, Fang Bin, Wu Zhong, and Li Qing. Time proved him right in every case. After nine years in office he returned as Vice Director of the Office of Imperial Seals and was promoted to Vice Director proper.

禮部郎周訥自福建還，言閩人祀南唐徐知諤、知誨，其神最靈。帝命往迎其像及廟祝以來，遂建靈濟宮於都城，祀之。帝每遘疾，輒遣使問神。廟祝詭為仙方以進，藥性多熱，服之輒痰壅氣逆，多暴怒，至失音，中外不敢諫。忠徹一日入侍，進諫曰：「此痰火虛逆之症，實靈濟宮符藥所致。」帝怒曰：「仙藥不服，服凡藥耶？」忠徹叩首哭，內侍二人亦哭。帝益怒，命曳二內侍杖之，且曰：「忠徹哭我，我遂死耶？」忠徹惶懼，趨伏階下，良久始解。帝識忠徹于籓邸，故待之異於外臣。忠徹亦以帝遇己厚，敢進讜言，嘗諫外國取寶之非，武臣宜許行服，衍聖公誥宜改賜玉軸，聞之韙之。

Zhou Ne, a Ministry of Rites secretary, came back from Fujian reporting that Min people venerated the Southern Tang brothers Xu Zhi'e and Xu Zhihui as powerfully responsive gods. The emperor had their statues and temple attendants brought to the capital and raised Lingji Palace there for their cult. Each time the emperor sickened, he dispatched messengers to consult the deity. Temple attendants fabricated 'immortal' formulas for him—drugs overwhelmingly hot in nature. After each dose phlegm choked his breath, false fire surged upward, rages multiplied, and he even lost his voice; at court and beyond, none dared speak. One day Zhongche attended the emperor and ventured, 'This is phlegm-fire with rebellious qi—the Lingji Palace talismans are what truly harm you. The emperor snapped, 'Am I to swallow ordinary medicine when I refuse the immortals' own prescription?' Zhongche prostrated himself and wept; two attending eunuchs wept with him. Furious, the emperor had the two eunuchs dragged out for a beating and cried, 'Zhongche weeps over me—as if my death were at hand! Terrified, Zhongche threw himself on the steps below; a long while passed before the emperor's wrath cooled. The emperor had known Zhongche since princely days and indulged him as no outsider could expect. Emboldened by the emperor's favor, he spoke blunt counsel: against plundering foreign tribute, for letting generals observe mourning, for replacing the Yansheng Duke's silk edict with a jade scroll—and the emperor accepted each in turn.

宣德初，睹帝容色曰：「七日內，宗室當有謀叛者。」漢王果反。嘗坐事下吏罰贖。正統中，復坐事下吏休致。二十餘年卒，年八十有三。

Early in Xuande he read the emperor's color and warned, 'Within seven days a prince of the blood will rebel. The Prince of Han rose in revolt, just as he had said. Once he ran afoul of the law, was handed to the magistrates, and paid a fine to escape punishment. Under Zhengtong he again fell afoul of the law, was handed to the magistrates, and retired from office. He died more than twenty years later, at eighty-three.

忠徹相術不殊其父，世所傳軼事甚多，不具載。其相王文，謂「面無人色，法曰瀝血頭」。相于謙，謂「目常上視，法曰望刀眼」。後果如其言。然性陰險，不如其父，與群臣有隙，即緣相法於上前齮齕之。頗好讀書，所著有《人相大成》及《鳳池吟稿》、《符台外集》，載元順帝為瀛國公子雲。

Zhongche's art matched his father's; legend preserves countless stories of him, not all set down here. Of Wang Wen he said, 'No human hue in the face—the rule calls this the dripping-blood head.' Of Yu Qian he said, 'Eyes forever lifted—the rule calls this the blade-gazing gaze.' Later history bore out both prophecies. Yet he was dark of temperament where his father had been open; when he quarreled with a minister he would read his face before the throne and whisper poison. He read widely and wrote The Great Completion of Human Physiognomy, Phoenix Pool Poems, and Outer Collection of the Talisman Tower—the last claiming that Yuan Shundi was the son of the Song's captive emperor.

戴思恭

Dai Sigong.

戴思恭，字原禮，浦江人，以字行。受學于義烏硃震亨。震亨師金華許謙，得硃子之傳，又學醫于宋內侍錢塘羅知悌。知悌得之荊山浮屠，浮屠則河間劉守真門人也。震亨醫學大行，時稱為丹溪先生。愛思恭才敏，盡以醫術授之。洪武中，征為御醫，所療治立效，太祖愛重之。燕王患瘕，太祖遣思恭往治，見他醫所用藥良是，念何以不效，乃問王何嗜。曰：「嗜生芹。」思恭曰：「得之矣。」投一劑，夜暴下，皆細蝗也。晉王疾，思恭療之愈。已，復發，即卒。太祖怒，逮治王府諸醫。思恭從容進曰：「臣前奉命視王疾，啟王曰：『今即愈，但毒在膏肓，恐復作不可療也。』今果然矣。」諸醫由是免死。思恭時已老，風雨輒免朝。太祖不豫，少間，出禦右順門，治諸醫侍疾無狀者，獨慰思恭曰：「汝仁義人也，毋恐。」已而太祖崩，太孫嗣位，罪諸醫，獨擢思恭太醫院使。永樂初，以年老乞歸。三年夏，復征入，免其拜，特召乃進見。其年冬，復乞骸骨，遣官護送，齎金幣，逾月而卒，年八十有二，遣行人致祭。所著有《證治要訣》、《證治類元》、《類證用藥》諸書，皆〈〉括丹谿之旨。又訂正丹谿《金匱鉤玄》三卷，附以己意。人謂無愧其師雲。

Dai Sigong, styled Yuanli, came from Pujiang and was known by that style. He studied under Zhu Zhenheng of Yiwu. Zhenheng had studied with Jinhua's Xu Qian, heir to Zhu Xi's tradition, and had also learned medicine from the Song palace eunuch Luo Zhitai of Qiantang. Luo Zhitai had learned from a monk of Jingshan, who in turn stood in the lineage of Hejian's Liu Shouzhen. Zhenheng's medicine spread far and wide; his contemporaries hailed him as Master of Danxi. Delighted by Sigong's sharp mind, he passed on his entire medical craft. Summoned as court physician in Hongwu, he cured at a touch; Taizu held him in high regard. When the Prince of Yan fell ill with an abdominal gathering, Taizu dispatched Sigong. The prescriptions others had used were sound enough—why no cure? Sigong asked what the prince liked to eat. The prince answered, 'Raw celery—I cannot get enough of it. Sigong said, 'There is the cause.' One dose followed; that night the prince purged violently, expelling nothing but tiny locusts. When the Prince of Jin sickened, Sigong healed him. The disease soon returned, and he died. Taizu flew into a rage and had every physician in the Jin princely household seized and punished. Sigong stepped forward calmly and said, "When I was sent to treat the prince, I told him, 'You will seem cured now, but the poison has reached your vital core—I warned that if it returned, no remedy would avail. And so it has proved. The physicians were spared execution. By then Sigong was elderly and was routinely excused from court on stormy days. When Taizu sickened, he soon appeared at the Right Shun Gate, punished every physician who had failed him in his illness, yet told Sigong alone, "You are a man of integrity—have no fear. Taizu soon died. When the heir succeeded, he punished the physicians but singled out Sigong for promotion to head of the Imperial Medical Academy. Early in the Yongle reign he requested retirement because of his age. In the third year of Yongle, he was recalled. He was excused from prostrating himself and was admitted only by special summons. That winter he again asked leave to go home. The court sent officials to escort him with gold and silks; he died a little over a month later, at eighty-two, and an imperial envoy was sent to offer sacrifices. Among his writings are Essentials of Pattern Identification and Treatment, Categories of Pattern Identification and Treatment, and Medicinal Use by Pattern Type—all He distilled the doctrines of Zhu Danxi. He also revised Danxi's three-juan Golden Coffer and Hooked Mystery, supplementing it with his own insights. People judged him worthy of his master.

盛寅，字啟東，吳江人。受業于郡人王賓。初，賓與金華戴原禮游，冀得其醫術。原禮笑曰：「吾固無所吝，君獨不能少屈乎？」賓謝曰：「吾老矣，不能復居弟子列。」他日伺原禮出，竊發其書以去，遂得其傳。將死，無子，以授寅。寅既得原禮之學，復討究《內經》以下諸方書，醫大有名。永樂初，為醫學正科。坐累，輸作天壽山。列侯監工者，見而奇之，令主書算。先是有中使督花鳥於江南，主寅舍，病脹，寅愈之。適遇諸途，驚曰：「盛先生固無恙耶！予所事太監，正苦脹，盍與我視之。」既視，投以藥立愈。會成祖較射西苑，太監往侍。成祖遙望見，愕然曰：「謂汝死矣，安得生？」太監具以告，因盛稱寅，即召入便殿，令診脈。寅奏，上脈有風濕病，帝大然之，進藥果效，遂授御醫。一日，雪霽，召見。帝語白溝河戰勝狀，氣以甚厲。寅曰：「是殆有天命耳。」帝不懌，起而視雪。寅復吟唐人詩「長安有貧者，宜瑞不宜多」句，聞者咋舌。他日，與同官對弈禦藥房。帝猝至，兩人斂枰伏地，謝死罪。帝命終之，且坐以觀，寅三勝。帝喜，命賦詩，立就。帝益喜，賜象牙棋枰並詞一闋。帝晚年猶欲出塞，寅以帝春秋高，勸毋行。不納，果有榆木川之變。

Sheng Yin, styled Qidong, came from Wujiang. He studied under Wang Bin, a fellow townsman. Early on Bin had befriended Jinhua's Dai Yuanli, hoping to learn his medicine. Yuanli smiled and said, "I hide nothing from anyone—could you not bend your pride a little? Bin demurred: "I am too old to sit among disciples again." One day he waited until Yuanli was out, stole his medical texts, and thus acquired the tradition. On his deathbed, childless, he passed them to Yin. Having mastered Yuanli's medicine, Yin went on to study the Inner Canon and the major formularies and won wide fame as a physician. Early in Yongle he held a senior post at the medical school. Caught up in a legal case, he was sent to labor at Tianshou Mountain. A marquis overseeing the project noticed him, was impressed, and put him in charge of accounts. Earlier a palace eunuch sent to procure flowers and birds in Jiangnan had lodged at Yin's home, suffered abdominal distension, and Yin cured him. Running into Yin on the road, he exclaimed, "Master Sheng—you are alive after all! The eunuch I attend is tormented by distension—come and see him with me. After the examination Yin prescribed medicine, and the patient was cured immediately. Chengzu happened to be holding an archery contest in the Western Park, and the eunuch went to serve him. Spotting him from a distance, Chengzu blurted out, "I thought you were dead—how can you still be alive? The eunuch gave a full account and praised Yin highly; Yin was summoned to the privy chamber to take the emperor's pulse. Yin reported signs of wind-damp illness; the emperor was convinced, the prescription worked, and Yin was made an imperial physician. One day, after a snowfall cleared, the emperor summoned him. The emperor recounted his victory at Baigou River, growing fiercely exultant as he spoke. Yin said, "That was surely Heaven's doing. The emperor took offense and got up to gaze at the snow. Yin then quoted a Tang line—"In Chang'an there are the poor: a little snow is blessing enough"—and listeners gasped. Another day he was playing weiqi with a colleague in the Imperial Pharmacy. The emperor burst in; both men hid the board, fell to the ground, and begged pardon for a capital offense. The emperor told them to finish the match and watched; Yin won three games straight. Delighted, the emperor asked him to compose a poem, and Yin produced one on the spot. Still more pleased, the emperor gave him an ivory weiqi board and a lyric of his own composition. Even in old age the emperor meant to march beyond the border; Yin urged him not to go, citing his advanced years. The emperor ignored him—and died at Yumuchuan.

仁宗在東宮時，妃張氏經期不至者十月，眾醫以妊身賀。寅獨謂不然，出言病狀。妃遙聞之曰：「醫言甚當，有此人何不令早視我。」及疏方，乃破血劑。東宮怒，不用。數日病益甚，命寅再視，疏方如前。妃令進藥，而東宮慮墮胎，械寅以待。已而血大下，病旋愈。當寅之被系也，闔門惶怖曰：「是殆磔死。」既三日，紅仗前導還邸舍，賞賜甚厚。

While the future Ren Emperor was still crown prince, Consort Zhang had missed her monthly courses for ten months and every physician congratulated her on being with child. Yin alone disagreed and named the symptoms of her true illness. Overhearing, the consort said, "That diagnosis is exactly right—why was this physician not brought to me sooner? When he wrote out his prescription, it called for a blood-dispersing formula. The crown prince was furious and refused the medicine. Days later her condition worsened; Yin was called back and prescribed the same formula again. The consort had the medicine given, but the crown prince, fearing abortion, had Yin bound and held for execution. Before long she expelled a large flow of blood and quickly recovered. While Yin was in chains, his household quaked, saying, "He will surely die by dismemberment. Three days later imperial guards escorted him home with lavish rewards.

寅與袁忠徹素為東宮所惡，既愈妃疾，而怒猶未解，懼甚。忠徹曉相術，知仁宗壽不永，密告寅，寅猶畏禍。及仁宗嗣位，求出為南京太醫院。宣宗立，召還。正統六年卒。兩京太醫院皆祀寅。寅弟宏亦精藥論，子孫傳其業。

Yin and Yuan Zhongche had long been detested by the crown prince; even after the consort recovered, his wrath was unabated, and they lived in dread. Zhongche, skilled in physiognomy, knew the Ren Emperor would not reign long and confided this to Yin—but Yin still feared retribution. When the Ren Emperor took the throne, Yin requested transfer to the Nanjing Imperial Medical Academy. When the Xuan Emperor came to the throne, Yin was summoned back. He died in the sixth year of Zhengtong (1441). Both Nanjing and Beijing Imperial Medical Academies honored Yin with sacrificial rites. Yin's brother Hong also mastered pharmacology, and the family profession passed down through his descendants.

初，寅晨直御醫房，忽昏眩欲死，募人療寅，莫能應。一草澤醫人應之，一服而愈。帝問狀，其人曰：「寅空心入藥房，猝中藥毒。能和解諸藥者，甘草也。」帝問寅，果空腹入，乃厚賜草澤醫人。

Once, on morning duty in the imperial pharmacy, Yin was suddenly stricken with dizziness so severe he thought he would die; physicians were summoned, but none could help. A country doctor answered; one dose cured him. When the emperor asked what ailed him, the man said, "Master Yin entered the pharmacy fasting and was suddenly poisoned by the drugs. Licorice neutralizes all medicines. The emperor questioned Yin, confirmed he had entered on an empty stomach, and richly rewarded the country doctor.

皇甫仲和

Huangfu Zhonghe.

皇甫仲和，睢州人。精天文推步學。永樂中，成祖北征，仲和與袁忠徹扈從。師至漠北，不見寇，將引還，命仲和占之，言：「今日未申間，寇當從東南來。王師始卻，終必勝。」忠徹對如之。比日中不至，復問，二人對如初。帝命械二人，不驗，將誅死。頃之，中官奔告曰：「寇大至矣。」時初得安南神砲，寇一騎直前，即以砲擊之，一騎復前，再擊之，寇不動。帝登高望之曰：「東南不少卻乎？」亟麾大將譚廣等進擊，諸將奮斫馬足，寇少退。俄疾風揚沙，兩軍不相見，寇始引去。帝欲即夜班師，二人曰：「明日寇必降，請待之。」至期果降，帝始神其術，授仲和欽天監正。

Huangfu Zhonghe came from Suizhou. He was expert in astronomy and calendrical calculation. During Yongle's northern campaigns, Zhonghe and Yuan Zhongche marched with the emperor. When the army reached the northern steppe and found no foe, Chengzu was about to turn back and ordered Zhonghe to cast a divination: "Between one and three this afternoon the enemy will arrive from the southeast. Our troops will give ground first but win in the end. Zhongche gave the same answer. When noon passed without sign of the enemy, Chengzu questioned them again and got the same reply. The emperor had them bound; when nothing happened, he prepared to put them to death. Soon a eunuch came running: "The enemy is upon us in force! They had just acquired the "divine cannon" from Annam. An enemy horseman rode forward and was blasted; another advanced and was blasted again—yet the enemy host did not budge. From a height the emperor called out, "They are scarcely falling back toward the southeast, are they? He ordered General Tan Guang and others to charge; the generals cut at the horses' legs and the enemy fell back a little. Suddenly a sandstorm arose; the armies lost sight of each other and the enemy finally withdrew. The emperor meant to march off that night, but the two said, "The enemy will submit tomorrow—wait. On the appointed day the enemy submitted as predicted. Chengzu then treated their art as miraculous and made Zhonghe Director of the Directorate of Astronomy.

仝寅，字景明，安邑人。年十二歲而瞽，乃從師學京房術，占禍福多奇中。父清游大同，攜之行塞上。石亨為參將，頗信之，每事咨焉。英宗北狩，遣使問還期。筮得《乾》之初，曰：「大吉。四為初之應，初潛四躍，明年歲在午，其幹庚。午，躍候也。庚良，更新也。龍歲一躍，秋潛秋躍，明年仲秋駕必復。但繇勿用，應在淵，還而復，必失位。然象龍也，數九也。四近五，躍近飛。龍在醜，醜曰赤奮若，復在午。午色赤，午奮於醜，若，順也，天順之也。其于丁，象大明也。位於南方，火也。寅其生，午其王，壬其合也。至歲丁丑，月寅，日午，合於壬，帝其復辟乎？」已而悉驗。

Tong Yin, styled Jingming, came from Anyi. Blinded at twelve, he studied Jingfang's divination under a master and often scored astonishingly accurate readings. His father Qing visited Datong and took him along on journeys beyond the border. Deputy Commander Shi Heng trusted him deeply and consulted him on every decision. When Emperor Yingzong was captured on the northern campaign, messengers asked when he would return. He cast the hexagram and drew the first line of Qian: "Great fortune. The fourth line responds to the first—the first still hidden, the fourth ready to leap. Next year is a wu year, with stem geng. Wu is the hour of the leap. Geng signifies renewal. The dragon leaps once a year—hidden through autumn, leaping in autumn—so by mid-autumn next year the emperor will surely return. Yet the lines say do not act; the answer lies in the depths—he will return, but on returning he will surely lose the throne. Yet the image is the dragon, and nine is its number. Four stands next to five; leaping stands next to soaring. The dragon rests in chou—"Red Exertion If"—then returns to wu. Wu's color is red; wu strives from chou; "ruo" means accord—it is Heaven's accord. Ding represents the Great Brightness. It stands in the south—the element of fire. Yin gives it birth, wu gives it mastery, and ren brings them into union. When the year is dingchou, the month yin, and the day wu converge upon ren, will the emperor regain the throne? In time every part of the prophecy came true.

石亨入督京營，挾自隨。及也先逼都城，城中人恟懼，或請筮之，寅曰：「彼驕我盛，戰必勝。」寇果敗去。明年，也先請遣使迎上皇，廷臣疑其詐。寅言於亨曰：「彼順天仗義，我中國反失奉迎禮，寧不貽笑外蕃。」亨乃與于謙決計，上皇果還。景泰三年，指揮盧忠告變，事連南宮。帝殺中官阮浪，猶窮治不已，外議洶洶。忠一日屏人請筮，寅叱之曰：「是兆大凶，死不足贖。」忠懼而徉狂，事得不竟。已而忠果伏誅。英宗復辟，將官寅，寅固辭。命賜金錢金卮諸物。其父官指揮僉事，將赴徐州。英宗慮寅偕行，乃授錦衣百戶，留京師。寅見石亨勢盛，每因筮戒之，亨不能用，卒及於禍。寅以筮游公卿貴人間，莫不信重之，然無一語及私。年幾九十乃卒。

When Shi Heng entered the capital to take command of the Metropolitan Garrison, he brought Yin with him. When Esen pressed the capital, panic spread through the city. Some asked for a divination. Yin said, "They are arrogant and we are strong—we will surely win if we fight. The invaders were indeed beaten and withdrew. The following year Esen asked to send envoys to escort the captive emperor home, but ministers at court suspected a ruse. Yin told Heng, "They act in accord with Heaven and righteousness, yet we of China would fail in the rites of welcome—would we not make ourselves a laughingstock among the outer tribes? Heng then settled the matter with Yu Qian, and the retired emperor did return as predicted. In the third year of Jingtai, Commander Lu Zhong denounced a conspiracy that touched the Southern Palace. The emperor executed the eunuch Ruan Lang, yet still pressed the inquiry without end, and public alarm grew loud. One day Zhong sent everyone away and asked for a divination. Yin rebuked him: "This omen is utterly dire—not even death would atone for it. Zhong, terrified, pretended to go mad, and the affair was never brought to completion. Before long Zhong was indeed put to death. When Yingzong regained the throne, he meant to appoint Yin to office, but Yin steadfastly refused. The emperor ordered gifts of gold, cash, gold goblets, and other valuables. His father served as Assistant Commander and was about to take up a post at Xuzhou. Fearing Yin would leave with his father, Yingzong made him a centurion of the Embroidered Uniform Guard and kept him in the capital. Seeing Shi Heng's power swell, Yin often warned him through divination, but Heng would not heed him and in the end met ruin. Yin moved among the great ministers and nobles by way of divination; all trusted and honored him, yet he never spoke a word on private affairs. He lived to nearly ninety before he died.

吳傑，武進人。弘治中，以善醫征至京師，試禮部高等。故事，高等入禦藥房，次入太醫院，下者遣還。傑言于尚書曰：「諸醫被征，待次都下十餘載，一旦遣還，誠流落可憫。傑願辭禦藥房，與諸人同入院。」尚書義而許之。正德中，武宗得疾，傑一藥而愈，即擢御醫。一日，帝射獵還，憊甚，感血疾。服傑藥愈，進一官。自是，每愈帝一疾，輒進一官，積至太醫院使，前後賜彪虎衣、繡春刀及銀幣甚厚。帝每行幸，必以傑扈行。帝欲南巡，傑諫曰：「聖躬未安，不宜遠涉。」帝怒，叱左右掖出。及駕還，漁於清江浦，溺而得疾。至臨清，急遣使召傑，比至，疾已深，遂扈歸通州。時江彬握兵居左右，慮帝晏駕己得禍，力請幸宣府。傑憂之，語近侍曰：「疾亟矣，僅可還大內。倘至宣府有不諱，吾輩寧有死所乎！」近侍懼，百方勸帝，始還京師。甫還而帝崩，彬伏誅，中外晏然，傑有力焉。未幾致仕。子希周，進士，戶科給事中；希曾，舉人。

Wu Jie came from Wujin. During the Hongzhi reign he was summoned to the capital for his medical skill and placed in the highest rank on the Ministry of Rites examination. By custom, the highest scorers entered the Imperial Pharmacy, the next entered the Imperial Medical Academy, and the rest were sent home. Jie said to the minister, "These physicians were summoned and have waited in the capital more than ten years. To dismiss them all at once would cast them adrift in genuine misery. I am willing to forgo the Imperial Pharmacy and enter the Academy together with them. The minister, moved by his sense of justice, agreed. During Zhengde, when the Martial Emperor fell ill, Jie cured him with a single prescription and was at once promoted to Imperial Physician. One day the emperor returned from the hunt utterly spent and contracted a hemorrhagic disorder. After taking Jie's medicine he recovered, and Jie was promoted one rank. Thereafter, each time he cured one of the emperor's illnesses he gained another rank, rising eventually to Director of the Imperial Medical Academy, and was richly rewarded with tiger-pattern robes, embroidered spring knives, and silver and cash. Whenever the emperor traveled, Jie was always taken along in attendance. When the emperor wished to tour the south, Jie remonstrated: "Your Sacred Person is not yet well—it is no time to travel far. The emperor flew into a rage and had attendants drag him out by the arms. On the return journey he fished at Qingjiang Ford, fell into the water, and fell ill. At Linqing he urgently sent for Jie; by the time Jie arrived the illness was already grave, and he escorted the emperor back to Tongzhou. Jiang Bin then held military power at the emperor's side. Fearing disaster if the emperor died on the road, he pressed hard for a journey to Xuanfu. Alarmed, Jie told the close attendants, "The illness is critical—we can barely manage a return to the inner palace. If we reach Xuanfu and the worst should happen, where would we even find a place to die! The attendants were terrified and urged the emperor by every means until at last he turned back to the capital. Hardly had he returned when the emperor died. Bin was executed, and court and country settled into calm—Jie had had much to do with it. Before long he retired. His son Xizhou, a jinshi, served as a supervising secretary in the Ministry of Revenue section; Xizeng was a provincial graduate.

附許慎

Appendix: Xu Shen

又有許紳者，京師人。嘉靖初，供事禦藥房，受知于世宗，累遷太醫院使，曆加工部尚書，領院事。二十年，宮婢楊金英等謀逆，以帛縊帝，氣已絕。紳急調峻藥下之，辰時下藥，未時忽作聲，去紫血數升，遂能言，又數劑而愈。帝德紳，加太子太保、禮部尚書，賜齎甚厚。未幾，紳得疾，曰：「吾不起矣。曩者宮變，吾自分不效必殺身，因此驚悸，非藥石所能療也。」已而果卒，賜諡恭僖，官其一子，恤典有加。明世，醫者官最顯，止紳一人。

There was also Xu Shen, a man of the capital. At the start of Jiajing he served in the Imperial Pharmacy, won the trust of Emperor Shizong, rose to Director of the Imperial Medical Academy, and in time was made Minister of Works while continuing to head the Academy. In the twentieth year the palace maid Yang Jinying and others plotted rebellion and strangled the emperor with silk cloth until his breath had stopped. Shen urgently prepared a strong medicine and administered it. The dose was given at the chen hour; by the wei hour the emperor suddenly groaned, expelled several sheng of dark blood, and could speak again. A few more doses and he was cured. Grateful, the emperor made Shen Grand Guardian of the Heir Apparent and Minister of Rites and lavished gifts upon him. Before long Shen fell ill and said, "I shall not get up again. In the palace upheaval I had resolved that if I failed I must kill myself. The shock and terror of that hour no medicine can heal. He soon died as he had foretold. He was given the posthumous title Gongxi, one son was granted office, and his funeral honors were enlarged. In the Ming, no physician ever reached higher office—Shen alone did.

附王綸

Appendix: Wang Lun

其士大夫以醫名者，有王綸、王肯堂。綸，字汝言，慈谿人，舉進士。正德中，以右副都御史巡撫湖廣，精於醫，所在治疾，無不立效。有《本草集要》、《名醫雜著》行於世。肯堂所著《證治準繩》，為醫家所宗，行履詳父《樵傳》。

Among scholar-officials famed for medicine were Wang Lun and Wang Kentang. Lun, styled Ruyan, came from Cixi and passed the jinshi examination. During Zhengde he served as Right Vice Censor-in-Chief and Grand Coordinator of Huguang. Skilled in medicine, he treated illness wherever he went with immediate effect. His Collected Essentials of the Materia Medica and Miscellaneous Writings of Famous Physicians circulated widely. Kentang's Standards of Pattern Identification and Treatment was revered by physicians; his life and career are recounted at length in his father's Record of the Woodcutter.

淩雲，字漢章，歸安人。為諸生，棄去。北游泰山，古廟前遇病人，氣垂絕，雲嗟歎久之。一道人忽曰：「汝欲生之乎？」曰：「然。」道人針其左股，立蘇，曰：「此人毒氣內侵，非死也，毒散自生耳。」因授雲針術，治疾無不效。

Ling Yun, styled Hanzhang, came from Gui'an. He had been a county student, but abandoned that path. Traveling north to Mount Tai, he came upon a dying man before an ancient temple and sighed long over him. A Daoist priest suddenly asked, "Do you want to save him? Yun said, "Yes. The priest needled the man's left thigh and he revived at once. "Noxious qi has invaded inward," he said. "This is not death. When the toxin disperses, life will return of itself. He then taught Yun the art of acupuncture, and Yun's treatments never failed.

裏人病嗽，絕食五日，眾投以補劑，益甚。雲曰：「此寒濕積也，穴在頂，針之必暈絕，逾時始蘇。」命四人分牽其發，使勿傾側，乃針，果暈絕。家人皆哭，雲言笑自如。頃之，氣漸蘇，復加補，始出針，嘔積痰鬥許，病即除。有男子病後舌吐。雲兄亦知醫，謂雲曰：「此病後近女色太蚤也。舌者心之苗，腎水竭，不能制心火，病在陰虛。其穴在右股太陽，是當以陽攻陰。」雲曰：「然。」如其穴針之，舌吐如故。雲曰：「此知瀉而不知補也。」補數劑，舌漸復故。

A neighbor lay ill with coughing and had eaten nothing for five days. Everyone gave him tonics, and he grew worse. Yun said, "This is accumulated cold and damp. The point is on the crown of the head. The needle will make him faint dead, and only after a while will he revive. He had four men hold the patient's hair so his head would not tilt, then needled him—and the man fainted dead as predicted. The family wept, but Yun spoke and laughed as if nothing were amiss. Before long breath returned. Yun added tonics, withdrew the needle, and the man vomited nearly a peck of stagnant phlegm. The illness vanished at once. A man who had recovered from illness could not retract his tongue. Yun's elder brother, who also knew medicine, told him, "He turned to women too soon after his illness. The tongue is the sprout of the heart. His kidney water is exhausted and cannot check heart fire—the disease is yin deficiency. The point lies on the Greater Yang meridian of the right thigh. One should use yang to strike at yin. Yun said, "Exactly. He needled that point as advised, but the tongue still hung out as before. Yun said, "That treats draining but not supplementing. After several tonifying doses, the tongue gradually returned to normal.

淮陽王病風三載，請於朝，召四方名醫，治不效。雲投以針，不三日，行步如故。金華富家歸，少寡，得狂疾，至裸形野立。雲視曰：「是謂喪心。吾針其心，心正必知恥。蔽之帳中，慰以好言釋其愧，可不發。」乃令二人堅持，用涼水噴面，針之果愈。吳江婦臨產，胎不下者三日，呼號求死。雲針刺其心，針出，兒應手下。主人喜，問故。曰：「此抱心生也。手針痛則舒。」取兒掌視之，有針痕。

The Prince of Huaiyang had suffered wind disorder for three years. He petitioned the court, which summoned famous physicians from every quarter, but none could cure him. Yun treated him with needles, and within three days he walked as before. A young widow from a wealthy family in Jinhua fell into madness and came to stand naked in the open country. Yun looked and said, "This is what is called loss of heart. If I needle her heart, once the heart is set right she will know shame again. Cover her in a curtain, comfort her with kind words to ease her shame, and the madness need not return. He had two men hold her fast, sprayed cold water on her face, and needled her—and she recovered. A woman in Wujiang was in labor, but for three days the child would not come down. She cried out, begging for death. Yun needled her heart, and as the needle came out the child dropped into his hand. The family rejoiced and asked why it worked. He said, "The child was clutching at the heart. When the hand felt the needle's sting, it let go. He looked at the infant's palm and found a needle mark.

孝宗聞雲名，召至京，命太醫官出銅人，蔽以衣而試之，所刺無不中，乃授御醫。年七十七，卒於家。子孫傳其術，海內稱針法者，曰歸安淩氏。

When Emperor Xiaozong heard of Yun's fame, he summoned him to the capital, had imperial medical officials bring out the bronze acupuncture figure, cover it with clothing, and test him. Every point Yun needled was true, and he was appointed Imperial Physician. He died at home at the age of seventy-seven. His descendants handed down his art, and throughout the realm the name for needle technique was the Ling clan of Gui'an.

附李玉

Appendix: Li Yu

有李玉者，官六安衛千戶，善針灸。或病頭痛不可忍，雖震雷不聞。玉診之曰：「此蟲啖腦也。」合殺蟲諸藥為末，吹鼻中，蟲悉從眼耳口鼻出，即愈。有跛人扶雙杖至，玉針之，立去其仗。兩京號「神針李玉」。兼善方劑。或病痿，玉察諸醫之方，與治法合而不效，疑之。忽悟曰：「藥有新陳，則效有遲速。此病在表而深，非小劑能愈。」乃熬藥二鍋傾缸內，稍冷，令病者坐其中，以藥澆之，逾時汗大出，立愈。

There was Li Yu, a company commander of the Lu'an Guard, skilled in acupuncture and moxibustion. Someone suffered headaches so fierce he could not endure them—even thunder he could not hear. Yu examined him and said, "Worms are eating his brain. He ground various worm-killing drugs into powder and blew it into the patient's nose; the worms emerged from his eyes, ears, mouth, and nose, and he recovered at once. A crippled man came in leaning on two crutches; Yu treated him with needles, and he walked away without them at once. In both capitals he was known as "Divine Needle Li Yu." He was equally adept at compound prescriptions. When someone suffered from wasting paralysis, Yu reviewed the prescriptions other physicians had written. The formulas matched standard treatment, yet they had no effect, and he began to doubt them. Suddenly he realized and said, "Medicines differ in freshness, and so their effects come quickly or slowly. This disease lies on the surface but runs deep—a small dose cannot cure it. He brewed two pots of medicine and poured them into a vat. When the liquid had cooled slightly, he had the patient sit in it and bathed him with the decoction. Before long he broke into a heavy sweat and recovered at once.

李時珍

Li Shizhen

李時珍，字東璧，蘄州人。好讀醫書，醫家《本草》，自神農所傳止三百六十五種，梁陶弘景所增亦如之，唐蘇恭增一百一十四種，宋劉翰又增一百二十種，至掌禹錫、唐慎微輩，先後增補合一千五百五十八種，時稱大備。然品類既煩，名稱多雜，或一物而析為二三，或二物而混為一品，時珍病之。乃窮搜博采，芟煩補闕，曆三十年，閱書八百餘家，稿三易而成書，曰《本草綱目》。增藥三百七十四種，厘為一十六部，合成五十二卷。首標正名為綱，餘各附釋為目，次以集解詳其出產、形色，又次以氣味、主治附方。書成，將上之朝，時珍遽卒。未幾，神宗詔修國史，購四方書籍。其子建元以父遺表及是書來獻，天子嘉之，命刊行天下，自是士大夫家有其書。時珍官楚王府奉祠正，子建中，四川蓬谿知縣。

Li Shizhen, styled Dongbi, was from Qizhou. He loved medical literature. The materia medica transmitted from Shennong listed only 365 entries; Tao Hongjing of the Liang added a similar number, Su Gong of the Tang another 114, Liu Han of the Song 120 more, and by the time of Zhang Yuxi and Tang Shenwei successive supplements had brought the total to 1,558—a corpus the age hailed as exhaustive. But the categories had become unwieldy and the names muddled—one substance might be split into two or three entries, or two substances lumped together as one. Shizhen found this intolerable. He then searched exhaustively and collected widely, pruning redundancy and filling gaps. Over thirty years he read more than eight hundred books, revised his draft three times, and produced a work called the Systematic Materia Medica (Bencao Gangmu). He added 374 materia medica entries, arranged them in sixteen divisions, and compiled fifty-two volumes. He placed the proper name first as the main heading, with supplementary entries under each; followed collected notes on provenance and appearance; and then listed qualities, taste, therapeutic uses, and attached prescriptions. When the book was complete and about to be presented to the throne, Shizhen died suddenly. Soon afterward Emperor Shenzong ordered work on the official history and called for books from across the empire. His son Jianyuan presented his father's final memorial together with the book. The emperor praised it and ordered publication throughout the realm, and from then on scholar-official households everywhere owned a copy. Shizhen had held the post of Director of Sacrifices in the Chu princely household; his son Jianzhong became magistrate of Pengxi in Sichuan.

附繆希雍

Appended: Miu Xiyong

又吳縣張頤、祁門汪機、杞縣李可大、常熟繆希雍皆精通醫術，治病多奇中。而希雍常謂《本草》出於神農，硃氏譬之《五經》，其後又復增補別錄，譬之注疏，惜硃墨錯互。乃沈研剖析，以本經為經，別錄為緯，著《本草單方》一書，行於世。

Zhang Yi of Wu county, Wang Ji of Qimen, Li Kedà of Qixian, and Miu Xiyong of Changshu were all deeply versed in medicine and often scored uncanny successes in curing disease. Xiyong often observed that the materia medica originated with Shennong; Zhu Zhenheng's edition was like the Five Classics, later supplements and Separate Records like commentaries and glosses—yet sadly the principal text and annotations had become tangled together. He studied the problem deeply, took the core classic as warp and the Separate Records as weft, and wrote the Single Prescriptions from the Materia Medica, which circulated widely.

周述學

Zhou Shuxue

周述學，字繼志，山陰人。讀書好深湛之思，尤邃於曆學，撰《中經》。用中國之算，測西域之占。又推究五緯細行，為《星道五圖》，於是七曜皆有道可求。與武進唐順之論曆，取歷代史志之議，正其訛舛，刪其繁蕪。又撰《大統萬年二曆通議》，以補歷代之所未及。自曆以外，圖書、皇極、律呂、山經、水志、分野、輿地、演算法、太乙、壬遁、演禽、風角、鳥占、兵符、陣法、卦影、祿命、建除、葬術、五運六氣、海道針經，莫不各有成書，凡一千餘卷，統名曰《神道大編》。嘉靖中，錦衣陸炳訪士于經歷沈煉，煉舉述學。炳禮聘至京，服其英偉，薦之兵部尚書趙錦。錦就訪邊事，述學曰：「今歲主有邊兵，應在乾艮。艮為遼東，乾則宣、大二鎮，京師可無虞也。」已而果然。錦將薦諸朝，會仇鸞聞其名欲致之，述學識其必敗，乃還裏。總督胡宗憲征倭，招至幕中，亦不能薦，以布衣終。

Zhou Shuxue, styled Jizhi, was from Shanyin. A voracious reader, he favored deep thought and was especially masterful in calendrical astronomy; he authored the Zhongjing. He applied Chinese computational methods to test astrological systems from the Western Regions. He also worked out the fine motions of the five planets and produced the Five Charts of Star Paths, so that trajectories could be calculated for all seven luminaries. Discussing calendrical science with Tang Shunzhi of Wujin, he drew on debates recorded in dynastic histories, corrected errors, and stripped away redundancy. He also wrote a Comprehensive Discussion of the Datong and Wannian Calendars to fill gaps left by earlier dynasties. Beyond calendrics he produced finished books on virtually every esoteric art—classics and historiography, the Supreme Ultimate, pitch pipes, mountain and water gazetteers, celestial divisions, mapping, computational astronomy, Grand Unity numerology, Ren Dun divination, star and bird augury, wind divination, military tallies, battle formations, hexagram shadows, fate calculation, day selection, burial rites, the five phases and six qi, and maritime compass navigation—more than a thousand volumes in all, gathered under the title Great Compendium of the Way of Spirits. During the Jiajing reign, Lu Bing of the Embroidered-Uniform Guard asked the clerk Shen Lian to recommend talented men; Lian put forward Shuxue. Lu Bing summoned him to the capital with full honors, was impressed by his commanding presence, and recommended him to Zhao Jin, the Minister of War. Zhao Jin asked his counsel on frontier matters. Shuxue said, "This year border fighting will occur, manifesting in the northwest and northeast trigrams. Gen corresponds to Liaodong; Qian to the Xuanfu and Datong garrisons—the capital will remain secure. Events soon proved him right. Zhao Jin was about to recommend him to court when Qiu Luan, having heard of him, sought to win him over. Shuxue saw that Qiu was doomed to fall and went home. When Grand Coordinator Hu Zongxian campaigned against Japanese pirates he took Shuxue into his staff but likewise could not secure him an appointment; Shuxue died a commoner.

張正常

Zhang Zhengchang

張正常，字仲紀，漢張道陵四十二世孫也。世居貴谿龍虎山。元時賜號天師。太祖克南昌，正常遣使上謁，已而兩入朝。洪武元年入賀即位。太祖曰：「天有師乎？」乃改授正一嗣教真人，賜銀印，秩視二品。設寮佐，曰贊教，曰掌書。定為制。

Zhang Zhengchang, styled Zhongji, was the forty-second-generation descendant of Zhang Daoling of Han. His family had lived for generations on Dragon-Tiger Mountain in Guixi. During the Yuan he received the title Celestial Master. After the founding emperor captured Nanchang, Zhengchang sent envoys to pay homage, then twice came to court in person. In Hongwu 1 he came to congratulate the emperor on his accession. The founding emperor asked, "Does Heaven have a master? He then received the title Perfect Man of the Orthodox Unity Succession in Teaching, with a silver seal and rank equivalent to the second grade. Offices were established for assistants titled Director of Instruction and Director of Scriptures. These appointments were made permanent by regulation.

長子宇初嗣。建文時，坐不法，奪印誥。成祖即位，復之。宇初嘗受道法于長春真人劉淵然，後與淵然不協，相詆訐。永樂八年卒，弟宇清嗣。宣德初，淵然進號大真人，宇清入朝懇禮部尚書胡濙為之請，亦加號崇謙守靜。

His eldest son Yuchu succeeded him. Under the Jianwen emperor he was punished for misconduct and stripped of his seal and patent. When the Yongle emperor came to the throne, the honors were restored. Yuchu had once studied the Way under Liu Yuanran, the Perfect Man of Eternal Spring, but they later quarreled and traded accusations. He died in Yongle 8; his younger brother Yuqing succeeded. Early in the Xuande reign Liu Yuanran was promoted to Great Perfect Man; Yuqing came to court and asked Minister of Rites Hu Ying to petition for a title for him as well, and received the added honor Esteemed, Humble, and Guarding Tranquility.

再傳至曾孫元吉，年幼，敕其祖母護持，而贈其父留綱為真人，封母高氏為元君。景泰五年入朝，乞給道童四百二十人度牒。濙復為請，許之。尋欲得大真人號，濙為請，又許之。天順七年再乞給道童三百五十人度牒，禮部尚書姚夔持不可，詔許度百五十人。

The line passed to the great-grandson Yuanji, who was still a child; the court ordered his grandmother to serve as guardian, posthumously made his father Liugang a Perfect Man, and ennobled his mother, Lady Gao, as Primordial Lady. In Jingtai 5 he came to court requesting ordination certificates for 420 young Taoists. Hu Ying again petitioned on his behalf, and the request was approved. He soon sought the title Great Perfect Man; Hu Ying petitioned again, and again the court agreed. In Tianshun 7 he asked again for certificates for 350 Taoist youths. Minister of Rites Yao Kui opposed the request, and the emperor authorized only 150 ordinations.

憲宗立，元吉復乞加母封，改太元君為太夫人，以吏部言不許，乃止。初，元吉已賜號沖虛守素昭祖崇法安恬樂靜玄同大真人，母慈惠靜淑太元君，至是加元吉號體玄悟法淵默靜虛闡道弘法妙應大真人，母慈和端惠貞淑太真君。然元吉素凶頑，至僭用乘輿器服，擅易制書。奪良家子女，逼取人財物。家置獄，前後殺四十餘人，有一家三人者。事聞，憲宗怒，械元吉至京，會百官廷訊，論死。於是刑部尚書陸瑜等請停襲，去真人號，不許。命仍舊制，擇其族人授之，有妄稱天師，印行符籙者，罪不貸。時成化五年四月也。元吉坐系二年，竟以夤緣免死，杖百，發肅州軍，尋釋為庶人。

When Emperor Xianzong came to the throne, Yuanji again sought a higher title for his mother, asking that Primordial Lady be changed to Grand Lady; the Ministry of Personnel refused, and he dropped the request. Yuanji had already held the lengthy honorific Great Perfect Man of Penetrating Emptiness and Mysterious Unity, and his mother the rank Primordial Lady. Now he received further titles as Great Perfect Man of Embodied Mystery and Wondrous Response, while his mother was elevated to Great True Lady. Yet Yuanji was notoriously brutal and defiant. He dared to use regalia reserved for the imperial carriage and altered official documents at will. He abducted children from respectable families and extorted money and goods. He kept a private jail at home and killed more than forty people over the years; in one case an entire family of three perished. When word reached the throne, Emperor Xianzong was furious. Yuanji was shackled and brought to the capital, tried before the assembled court, and condemned to death. Minister of Justice Lu Yu and others then petitioned to end the hereditary succession and strip the Perfect Man title, but the emperor refused. He ordered the old system maintained and invested a clansman in the lineage, but decreed that anyone who falsely claimed the title Celestial Master or printed talismans without authorization would not escape punishment. This occurred in the fourth month of Chenghua 5. Yuanji remained in custody for two years but ultimately escaped execution through backroom influence. He received a hundred strokes, was sent to military exile in Suzhou, and was soon released as a commoner.

族人元慶嗣，弘治中卒。子彥嗣，嘉靖二年進號大真人。彥知天子好神仙，遣其徒十餘人乘傳詣雲南、四川採取遺經、古器進上方，且以蟒衣玉帶遺鎮守中貴，為雲南巡撫歐陽重所劾，不問。十六年禱雪內庭有驗，賜金冠玉帶、蟒衣銀幣，易金印，敕稱卿不名。彥入朝所經，郵傳供應或後期，常山知縣吳襄等至下按臣治。

The clansman Yuanqing succeeded him and died during the Hongzhi reign. His son Yan succeeded, and in Jiajing 2 received the title Great Perfect Man. Knowing the emperor's fascination with immortals, Yan dispatched more than ten disciples by courier to Yunnan and Sichuan to gather lost scriptures and ancient artifacts for the court. He also gave python robes and jade belts to resident eunuchs. Yunnan grand coordinator Ouyang Chong impeached him, but no action was taken. In Jiajing 16 his prayer for snow in the inner court succeeded. The emperor bestowed a golden crown, jade belt, python robe, and silver coins, replaced his seal with one of gold, and decreed that edicts address him as "Minister" without using his personal name. When Yan came to court, relay stations along his route sometimes failed to meet his needs on time. Magistrates such as Wu Xiang of Changshan were handed over to touring censors for punishment.

傳子永緒，嘉靖末卒，無子。吏部主事郭諫臣乘穆宗初政，上章請奪其世封。下江西守臣議，巡撫任士憑等力言宜革，乃去真人號，改授上清觀提點，秩五品，給銅印，以其宗人國祥為之。萬曆五年，馮保用事，復國祥故封，仍予金印。國祥傳至應京。崇禎十四年，帝以天下多故，召應京有所祈禱。既至，命賜宴。禮臣言：「天順中制，真人不與宴，但賜筵席。今應京奉有優旨，請仿宴法王佛子例，宴于靈濟宮，以內官主席。」從之。明年三月，應京請加三官神封號，中外一體尊奉。禮官力駁其謬，事得寢。張氏自正常以來，無他神異，專恃符籙，祈雨驅鬼，間有小驗。顧代相傳襲，閱世既久，卒莫廢去雲。

The line passed to his son Yongxu, who died near the end of the Jiajing reign without an heir. At the start of Emperor Muzong's reign, Guo Jianchen, a director in the Ministry of Personnel, memorialized asking that the hereditary title be abolished. The matter was referred to Jiangxi officials. Grand Coordinator Ren Shiying and others argued forcefully for abolition. The Perfect Man title was removed; the post became Director of the Shangqing Abbey, fifth rank, with a copper seal, and the clansman Guoxiang was appointed. In Wanli 5 the eunuch Feng Bao was in power; Guoxiang's old title was restored and he again received a golden seal. The lineage continued from Guoxiang to Yingjing. In Chongzhen 14, with the empire beset by crisis, the emperor summoned Yingjing to offer prayers. When he arrived, the emperor ordered a banquet in his honor. Officials of rites noted that under Tianshun-era regulations Perfect Men did not attend banquets but received banquet provisions only. Since Yingjing had received a special edict, they proposed following the precedent for Dharma Kings and Buddha Sons and holding the banquet at Lingji Palace with a palace eunuch presiding. The emperor agreed. The following March, Yingjing asked that enhanced honorific titles be granted to the Three Officials deities and that they be venerated uniformly across court and country. Rites officials vigorously rejected the proposal as improper, and the matter was dropped. Since Zhengchang's day the Zhang family had shown no great miracles, relying chiefly on talismans for rain-making and exorcism, with only occasional minor successes. Yet the line endured generation after generation; having lasted so long, it was never finally abolished.

附劉淵然等

Appended: Liu Yuanran and others

劉淵然者，贛縣人。幼為祥符宮道士，頗能呼召風雷。洪武二十六年，太社聞其名，召至，賜號高道，館朝天宮。永樂中，從至北京。仁宗立，賜號長春真人，給二品印誥，與正一真人等。宣德初，進大真人。七年乞歸朝天宮，禦制山水圖歌賜之。卒年八十二，閱七日入殮，端坐如生。淵然有道術，為人清靜自守，故為累朝所禮。其徒有邵以正者，雲南人，早得法於淵然。淵然請老，薦之，召為道籙司左玄義。正統中，遷左正一，領京師道教事。景泰時，賜號悟玄養素凝神沖默闡微振法通妙真人。天順三年，將行慶成宴。故事，真人列二品班末，至是，帝曰：「殿上宴文武官，真人安得與。」其送筵席與之，遂為制。

Liu Yuanran was from Ganxian. As a youth he became a priest at Xiangfu Palace and was reputedly able to summon wind and thunder. In Hongwu 26 the empress dowager heard of him, summoned him to court, gave him the title Exalted in the Way, and lodged him at Chaotian Palace. During the Yongle reign he accompanied the court to Beijing. When Emperor Renzong came to the throne, he received the title Perfect Man of Eternal Spring, with a second-grade seal and patent ranking him alongside the Orthodox Unity Perfect Man. Early in the Xuande reign he was promoted to Great Perfect Man. In the seventh year of Xuande he asked to return to Chaotian Palace, and the emperor bestowed on him an ode he had composed for a landscape painting. He died at eighty-two. Seven days later, when he was placed in his coffin, he sat upright as if still alive. Yuanran knew the arts of the Way and lived quietly and self-disciplined, and so earned the respect of several reigns. Among his disciples was Shao Yizheng of Yunnan, who had studied under Yuanran from an early age. When Yuanran asked to retire, he recommended Shao Yizheng, who was summoned and appointed Left Initiate of the Taoist Registry. During the Zhengtong reign he rose to Left Perfect Unity and oversaw Daoist affairs in the capital. Under Jingtai he received the long honorific title Perfect Man of Penetrating Mystery, Nourishing Simplicity, Concentrating Spirit, Serene Reserve, Expounding the Subtle, Reviving the Law, and Pervading Wonder. In Tianshun 3 the court prepared to hold the celebratory victory banquet. By custom the Perfect Man took his place at the tail of the second-rank seating, but this time the emperor said, 'The hall feast is for civil and military officers—how can a Perfect Man sit among them? His portion was sent out to him separately, and that arrangement became permanent practice.

又有沈道寧者，亦有道術。仁宗初，命為混元純一沖虛湛寂清靜無為承宣佈澤助國佐民廣大至道高士，階正三品，賜以法服。

Another figure was Shen Daoning, who likewise practiced the arts of the Way. Early in Emperor Renzong's reign he was named Eminent Master of the Vast Way—with the full string of honorifics from Pure Unity of the Primal Origin through Assisting the State and Aiding the People—at the regular third rank, and given formal Daoist robes.

時有浮屠智光者，亦賜號圓融妙慧淨覺弘濟輔國光範衍教灌頂廣善大國師，賜以金印。智光，武定人。洪武時，奉命兩使烏斯藏諸國。永樂時，又使烏斯藏，迎尚師哈立麻，遂通番國諸經，多所譯解。曆事六朝，寵錫冠群僧，與淵然輩淡泊自甘，不失戒行。迨成化、正德、嘉靖朝，邪妄雜進，恩寵濫加，所由與先朝異矣。

The Buddhist monk Zhiguang received a comparable honorific as Great State Preceptor of Perfect Harmony, Wondrous Wisdom, Pure Awakening, Broad Salvation, Assisting the State, Radiant Model, Propagating the Teaching, Abhisheka, and Extensive Goodness, together with a golden seal. Zhiguang came from Wuding. Under Hongwu he was twice dispatched on embassy to the states of Tibet. Under Yongle he went again to Tibet to escort the Karmapa to court, mastered the Buddhist canon of the western regions, and produced numerous translations and exegeses. He served six reigns and received favors surpassing any other monk, yet like Liu Yuanran and his peers he lived simply and never abandoned monastic discipline. By the Chenghua, Zhengde, and Jiajing reigns charlatans and impostors crowded the court, imperial favor was dispensed without restraint, and the age had diverged sharply from the founding era.

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