Lingshu · Long Life, Early Death, Hard and Soft

The text

The Yellow Emperor asked Shao Shi: I have heard that when a person is born, there is the hard and the soft, the weak and the strong, the short and the long, the yin and the yang. I wish to hear their ways. Shao Shi answered: Within yin there is yin; within yang there is yang. Examine and know yin and yang, and piercing has its ways. Obtain where the illness began, and piercing has its pattern. Carefully measure the tip of the illness, and answer it with the seasons. Within it joins the five zang and six fu; without it joins sinew, bone, and skin. Therefore within there is yin and yang; without there is also yin and yang. Within: the five zang are yin, the six fu are yang. Without: sinew and bone are yin, skin is yang. Therefore it is said: illness in the yin of yin — pierce the ying and transports of yin. Illness in the yang of yang — pierce the joining of yang. Illness in the yin of yang — pierce the channels of yin. Illness in the yang of yin — pierce the collateral vessels. Therefore it is said: illness in yang is named wind; illness in yin is named impediment; yin and yang both ill is named wind-impediment. Illness that has form and does not ache is of the kind of yang; illness that has no form and aches is of the kind of yin. What has no form and aches: its yang is complete and its yin has been wounded — put the yin in order at once; do not attack the yang. What has form and does not ache: its yin is complete and its yang has been wounded — put the yang in order at once; do not attack the yin. When yin and yang both move, now having form, now having no form, and vexation of the heart is added — this is named yin overcoming its yang. This is called neither surface nor interior; the form will not last long. The Yellow Emperor asked Bo Gao: I have heard of form and qi, of the first and last of illness, of the answering of outer and inner — how is it? Bo Gao answered: Wind and cold wound the form; worry, fear, rage, and anger wound qi. Qi wounds the zang, and then the zang is ill; cold wounds the form, and then the form answers. Wind wounds sinew and vessel, and sinew and vessel then answer. This is how form and qi, outer and inner, answer one another. The Yellow Emperor said: How does one pierce it? Bo Gao answered: Illness of nine days: three piercings and it is finished. Illness of one month: ten piercings and it is finished. More and less, far and near — diminish it by this. For long impediment that will not leave the body, look at the blood collaterals and let their blood go out to the end. The Yellow Emperor said: Illness of outer and inner, the hard and easy of putting them in order — how is it? Bo Gao answered: If the form is first ill and it has not yet entered the zang, pierce half its days. If the zang is first ill and the form then answers, pierce twice its days. This is the answering of the hard and easy of outer and inner. The Yellow Emperor asked Bo Gao: I have heard that form has the slow and the urgent, qi has abundance and decline, bone has the large and the small, flesh has the firm and the brittle, skin has the thick and the thin. How does one by these establish long life and early death? Bo Gao said: If form and qi are a match for one another, there is long life; if they are not a match, there is early death. If skin and flesh enclose one another, there is long life; if they do not enclose one another, there is early death. If blood, qi, and the channel networks overcome the form, there is long life; if they do not overcome the form, there is early death. The Yellow Emperor said: What is meant by the slow and urgent of form? Bo Gao answered: Form full and the skin slow: there is long life. Form full and the skin urgent: there is early death. Form full and the vessels firm and large: this is with. Form full and the vessels small and weak: qi is in decline; decline, and then there is danger. If the form is full and the cheekbones do not rise: the bones are small; bones small, and then there is early death. Form full and the great flesh sickle-firm and having grain: the flesh is firm; flesh firm, and then there is long life. Form full and the great flesh without grain, not firm: the flesh is brittle; flesh brittle, and then there is early death. This is the life Heaven gives. That by which one establishes form, settles qi, and looks at long life and early death — one must be clear about this. Establish form and settle qi, and only then stand before the one who is ill and decide death and life. The Yellow Emperor said: I have heard of long life and early death, and have no measure for them. Bo Gao answered: If the wall-foundation is low, and what is high does not reach its ground, one dies before filling thirty. If illness is added on this account, one dies before reaching twenty. The Yellow Emperor said: Form and qi overcoming one another — how does one by this establish long life and early death? Bo Gao answered: In an even person, if qi overcomes form, there is long life. In illness, if form and flesh have slipped away and qi overcomes form, there is death; if form overcomes qi, there is danger. The Yellow Emperor said: I have heard that piercing has three changes. What are the three changes? Bo Gao answered: There is piercing ying; there is piercing wei; there is piercing cold impediment that remains in the channels. The Yellow Emperor said: How does one pierce the three changes? Bo Gao answered: To pierce ying is to let blood go out. To pierce wei is to let qi go out. To pierce cold impediment is to bring heat within. The Yellow Emperor said: Ying, wei, and cold impediment as illness — how are they? Bo Gao answered: When ying gives birth to illness: cold and heat, little qi, blood traveling above and below. When wei gives birth to illness: qi communicates, now coming, now going; oppressed, indignant, rushing and sounding; wind and cold are guests in the intestines and stomach. Cold impediment as illness: it remains and will not leave; at times there is pain, and the skin does not feel. The Yellow Emperor said: To pierce cold impediment and bring heat within — how is it? Bo Gao answered: To pierce the cloth-clad, quench it with fire. To pierce the great person, iron it with medicine. The Yellow Emperor said: How does one iron with medicine? Bo Gao answered: Use twenty jin of pure wine, one sheng of Shu pepper, one jin of dried ginger, one jin of cinnamon heart — four kinds in all; chew them coarse and soak them in the wine. Use one jin of silk floss and four zhang of fine white cloth, and put them together into the wine. Set the wine in a smolder of horse dung; cover, seal, and daub it; do not let it leak. After five days and five nights, take out the cloth and the floss and dry them in the sun; when dry, soak them again, until the juices are exhausted. At each soaking one must wait out the day, then take them out and dry them. When dry, use the dregs together with the floss, and double the cloth into doubled cloths, six or seven chi long, making six or seven cloths. Then, when using them, roast the cloths over live mulberry charcoal, and iron the places where cold impediment was pierced, so that the heat enters as far as the place of illness. When it cools, roast the cloths again and iron; thirty times and stop. When sweat goes out, wipe the body with a cloth; also thirty times and stop. Rise and walk within the inner rooms; do not meet the wind. At each piercing one must iron. In this way the illness is finished. This is what is called heat within.

The line

The Yellow Emperor asked Shao Shi: I have heard that when a person is born, there is the hard and the soft, the weak and the strong, the short and the long, the yin and the yang. I wish to hear their ways.

The note

Hard and soft, strong and weak, short and long, yin and yang: from birth they are not even. Long life and early death are not a blame. They ask whether form and qi still match.