The Source of Medicine

Yi Yuan (The Source of Medicine), in one volume, is attributed to Fen Yushi of the Qing dynasty, though the author's surname, given name, and biography can no longer be verified. According to the prefaces and postscripts, the work circulated for a long time in manuscript form among physicians in the Yizheng area of Jiangsu, passed down through three generations of the Xiao family over nearly a century, and their forebears relied on it extensively in practicing medicine and teaching students. It was later transcribed by Lu Yuhe and collated by Shi Yiren, and published in the Shaoxing Medical Journal, thus passing from manuscript into print. The book is devoted chiefly to expounding the meaning of the classics, modeling its style on such works as the Inner Canon, the Classic of Difficult Issues, and the Golden Cabinet, while offering frequent analysis and correction of earlier doctrines; it has accordingly been praised as "even more refined than Shi's Medical Sources." Its contents fall roughly into two categories. The first consists of expositions of medical theory and the doctrine of visceral manifestations and yin-yang, with discussions centered on such themes as the human body as a supreme ultimate, the numerology of the He River Chart and Luo River Square, the ascent and descent of yin and yang, the prenatal and postnatal, sovereign fire and ministerial fire, true yin and true yang, diseases governed by the heart and kidneys, and deficient versus excess fire, together with critiques of earlier diagrams and theories such as Zhao's Diagram of the Human Body as Supreme Ultimate. The second comprises specialized treatises on disease patterns, with separate discussions of phlegm-fluid retention, cough, consumptive exhaustion, malaria, and dysentery, each covering such major headings as pulse methods, treatment methods, and formulas and drugs. Examples include the major methods for treating fluid retention, the explanation of using dried ginger and Schisandra for cough, clarification of the five Golden Cabinet formulas for cough, questions and answers on malarial masses, the argument that dysentery should not be treated by promoting urination, and the argument that dysentery should not be treated by inducing sweating. The discussions of malaria and dysentery are especially detailed, unfolding layer by layer from pulse and pattern differentiation to prohibitions and correction of errors, and best reveal the author's clinical experience. Though modest in length, the book is rigorous in argument and clear in organization. A work of medical discourse transmitted privately among physicians of the Qing dynasty, it is suitable as a reference for studying the Chinese medical classics and understanding the thinking of traditional physicians.