Suwen · Decoctions and Sweet Wines

The text

The Yellow Emperor asked: How does one make decoctions and sweet wines from the five grains? Qi Bo replied: It must be with rice, cooked over rice-straw. The rice is complete; the straw is firm. The Emperor said: Why is this so? Qi Bo said: These have obtained the harmony of heaven and earth, and what is fitting of high and low; therefore they can reach completeness. They are cut and gathered in their time; therefore they can reach firmness. The Emperor said: The sages of high antiquity made decoctions and sweet wines, yet made them and did not use them. Why? Qi Bo said: From of old, when the sages made decoctions and sweet wines, it was only as a provision. In high antiquity they made the decoctions, and therefore made them and did not drink them. In the age of middle antiquity, virtue and the Dao had slightly declined; pathogenic qi arrived from time to time, and taking them was wholly sufficient. The Emperor said: In this present age they are not necessarily enough to end it. Why? Qi Bo said: In this present age one must prepare strong medicines to attack the center, and use the pointed stone, the needle, and moxa to treat the outside. The Emperor said: When the form is worn and the blood is spent, and still no result is established — why? Qi Bo said: The spirit does not employ it. The Emperor said: What is meant by the spirit not employing it? Qi Bo said: The needle and the stone are a Dao. When jing and spirit do not advance, when will and intent are not in order, the illness cannot be healed. Now the jing is ruined and the spirit has gone; ying and wei cannot be gathered back. Why? Desires are without end, and worry and suffering do not stop. Jing-qi slacks and ruins; ying weeps and wei is removed. Therefore the spirit leaves, and the illness is not healed. The Emperor said: When illness first arises it is extremely fine, extremely subtle; it must first enter and knot in the skin. Now the good workers all say: once the illness is complete it is called against — then needle and stone cannot treat it, and good medicines cannot reach it. Now the good workers have all obtained the method and keep the numbers; relatives and brothers, near and far, their voices are heard daily in the ear, the five colors are seen daily by the eye — and still the illness is not healed. How is it they had no leisure to act early? Qi Bo said: The illness is the root; the worker is the branch. When root and branch are not obtained, the pathogenic qi does not submit. This is what is meant. The Emperor said: There are those whose illness does not arise from the fine hairs: the yang of the five zang is exhausted. Fluids fill the outer walls; the po dwells alone; jing is isolated within; qi is spent without; the form cannot keep company with its clothes. The four extremities are tense and the center is stirred — this is qi refusing within, and the form spreading without. How is it treated? Qi Bo said: Treat it level by the balance. Remove the stagnant and the old cuttings. Stir the four extremities a little; keep the clothes warm; needle the opposite side at the place, to restore the form. Open the ghost-gates; cleanse the clean fu. Jing is taken in at the due time; the five yang are already spread; the five zang are flushed and rinsed. Therefore jing is born of itself, the form flourishes of itself, bone and flesh keep one another, and the great qi is level. The Emperor said: Good.

The line

Qi Bo said: The illness is the root; the worker is the branch.

The note

Decoctions and sweet wines grow thicker only after middle antiquity. The illness is the root; the worker is the branch. However fine the medicine, it is still only the branch. The root remains the person's own spirit and qi.