《金华玉液大丹》

One jin of cinnabar (zhusha), chosen for its bright color and luster. Separately, take sanyou wood (gathered in the second month), fresh lotus leaves (gathered in the fourth month), and vervain (gathered in the eighth month).

Burn each of these three herbs to ash, take roughly one dou of each, rinse the ashes with water, and collect the concentrated liquid that drains through. Use this liquid to simmer the cinnabar for one month. The original text says that after "three hundred and sixty ji" the cinnabar turns snow-white; the meaning of the character ji here is unclear. The finished product is called "Jade Efflorescence" (yuying). The scripture (Jing) claims that taking it can cure all kinds of illness.

Method of Simmering

Place the cinnabar prepared above into a small bottle, add the liquid made from the three herb ashes, and fill the bottle to about eight-tenths of its capacity. Wrap crushed fresh ginger in cloth and use it to plug the mouth of the bottle. Then set the small bottle inside another vessel filled with water, and heat it by double boiling for one day.

After removing the cinnabar, boil it with honey locust pods (zaojiao) for one day, then grind it into a fine powder, and finally wash it five to seven times in running water.

Method of Nourishing

Quench six minerals in vinegar and then pound them to pieces: yangqishi (actinolite), magnetite, yuyuliang (limonite), daizheshi (red ochre), purple quartz, and yushi. Separately, grind saltpeter (xiaoshi) and taiyin xuanjing (Taiyin Mysterious Essence) until they dissolve into a liquid. Combine this with the materials above and grind them fine to make the outer lute, or waikui (the protective sealing material that surrounds the vessel). The original text is repetitive at this point, and its record of the materials and quantities is not clear.

Use twelve liang of silver to make a spirit chamber, or shenshi (the inner chamber that holds the ingredients during the refining of elixirs). Put the cinnabar prepared above inside, then fill the sand crucible with the outer lute and seal it according to the method. Nourish it over a bed of ashes with top fire for one month, with the heat at two to four liang. When the period is complete, take it out; it is called "Jade Liquid" (yuye). The scripture says it can transmute copper into silver and turn hard lead into a precious substance.

Next, use twelve liang of gold to make a spirit chamber, place the Jade Liquid inside it, and enclose it with the same outer lute as before. Put it into the sand crucible and seal it according to the method. Again nourish it over a bed of ashes with top fire for one month, this time with the heat at four to six liang. When the period is complete, take it out. The finished product is greenish-brown, like dust on a bright window, and is called "Purple Powder" (zifen). According to the scripture, a half zhu of it at a time can solidify one liang of mercury into precious silver.

The purple powder (zifen) prepared earlier is bathed briefly in a decoction of Sichuan pepper (huajiao) and fangji (Stephania root). Separately, twelve liang of silver are fashioned into an inner "spirit chamber" (shenshi). Three parts of one material, female, and four parts of another, male, are ground together and loaded into this inner chamber. Sixteen liang of gold are then fashioned into an outer spirit chamber, and the purple powder is placed inside it. The inner chamber is set within the outer one, and the outer chamber is placed in the previously described Eight-Stone Cabinet (bashi gui), sealed with sand.

The materials are then nourished with fire according to the proper heating schedule for one month, using two to six liang of fire each day. When the period is complete, the cabinet is opened for inspection. The silver chamber and the purple powder have both turned into yellow gold, known as "Golden Efflorescence" (jinhua). Each time half a zhu is taken, it can congeal one liang of mercury into "geng" (an alchemical term for the metallic product that results from refining).

At this stage, the Eight Stones are discarded. Only the Golden Efflorescence and the female and male materials nurtured in the inner chamber are ground together to make the outer cabinet. Another sixteen liang of gold are fashioned into a spirit chamber, into which ten liang of raw cinnabar are loaded. This is placed inside the Golden Efflorescence cabinet and sealed with sand. Following the method, it is set in an ash pit and nourished for forty-nine days with the "Six Yang Fire" (liuyang huo, the yang-fire phase of the alchemical heating schedule). When the term is complete, the cabinet is opened. The Golden Efflorescence appears as purple gold and can be used to make the "Longevity Cabinet" (changsheng gui). The cinnabar is the color of chalcanthite (blue vitriol) and is called "Purple Mist Elixir" (zixia dan).

Each time, half a zhu of the refined cinnabar is taken and formed into pills with paper mulberry sap (chuzhi). When these are mixed with five liang of mercury, yellow gold can be produced. The elixir can also transform the Five Metals into precious substances, and this cycle of transformation continues without end.

Silver Essence Elixir (Yinjing Dan)

Four liang of cinnabar, six liang of powder frost (fenshuang), and half a jin of Three Friends Frost (sanyou shuang). When refining the frost-type substances, the cinnabar is placed in a cloth bag with a lining and suspended in a vessel to be cooked over water, which gives better results.

Take a portion of mulberry-wood ash, leach it with water, and extract the concentrated liquid. Simmer this over a gentle fire. Place a handful of rice straw in the pot, and the liquid will form a frost-like substance on it. Rinse this with clean water, then boil it dry to make the frost. First spread a layer of frost as a base, then lay the powder frost around the edges and through the middle. Place the cinnabar within, and finally cover it once more with powder frost. Next, cover it with a roof tile spread with mulberry-ash frost and seal the joint, then seal the ash basin tightly with "Six-One Mud" (a clay material used for sealing). Nurture it for seven days with Yang fire (the fire of the outer furnace), using nine liang as the measure for the heat.

When the nurturing period is complete, heat the vessel until it glows red, take it out of the ash basin, and let it cool before removing the cinnabar. What results is as white as silver filings and quite marvelous. Jin once used this method in place of the elixir seed for the Great Elixir of the Golden Flower, considering its efficacy to be comparable, and so recorded the method here.

Elixir of the Four Sages

Pi, eight liang; powder, six liang; Xiong (male), three liang; Ci (female), three liang.

Take Pi (the name of a mineral drug; the original does not say what it is) and boil it in two huai of su juice and three huai of eclipta juice until the liquid is used up, then wash it clean. Next add half a huai of su juice and stir-fry until the liquid is used up. Grind it into powder. Take about three jin of xun-su, decoct it down to a thick liquid, and use this liquid to boil the powder until the liquid is used up.

For the male ingredient, use two jin of duck-tongue herb, soaked and boiled in rice-washing water until the liquid is used up. For the female ingredient, use about two jin of perilla herb, decocted in rice-bran vinegar and boiled until the liquid is used up.

Take six liang of the powder and mix it with six liang of Shanze silver to form a fine powder. Mix four liang of this with the powder and place it at the bottom of the fire cauldron (ding). Press the remaining two liang of silver powder on top, then place it all in the water-and-fire cauldron and seal the whole body of the cauldron completely, following the prescribed method. Soak and boil it in mercury until the liquid is used up.

For each liang of powder, add half a liang of treated mercury (the "foot" refers to the mercury material left over or adhering after refining), and refine it again. Before use, boil it once more, as if cooking it in a broth.

To seal the materials, mix wuming yi, ant powder, paper fiber, and salt clay, and pound the mixture repeatedly. Spread and pack ash firmly around the cauldron, leaving the water cauldron exposed, along with the place that receives the refining heat. First apply one jin of fire and refine for two double-hours, then lift the vessel off. Raise the vessel about half a cun on tile supports, and refine over concentrated fire for one double-hour. After this, increase the fire step by step in the same way: add one tile support each time, refine for one double-hour, and lift off, until all four tile supports have been added. Finally, add one or two pieces of good charcoal at the bottom so that the materials are heated. When the fire reaches three jin, surround it with tiles and add one more jin of fire. This is the fire phasing for the full batch of ingredients; at this stage, proceed with caution and judge according to the actual conditions. Then cover the furnace with ash and let it cool. Once cool, take out the powder mother and separate the embryo body.

Grind the powder above finely, mix it evenly with Pi and the other ingredients, and place it in the cauldron. Set aside two liang of Pi, blend it with vinegar, press it on top, and seal. After nourishing the fire for three rounds, add one more jin of fire. This is the fire phasing for the full batch of ingredients; at this stage, proceed with caution. Then cover the furnace with ash and let the furnace cool. Once cool, take out the powder mother and separate the embryo body.

First, grind the medicinal powder finely, then grind it evenly together with "pi" (毗, a material used in alchemical refining, as named in the original text), and place both into the cauldron (ding). Set aside two liang of pi, mix it with vinegar, press it onto the mouth of the cauldron, and seal the mouth tightly. Then nurture and refine the contents for twenty-one days according to the prescribed firing schedule (huohou).

The firing for the first seven-day round is as follows: on the first day, use two liang of charcoal; on the second day, two and a half liang; from the third day through the seventh, four liang each day. When the seven days are complete, wait for the furnace to cool, then take out the materials, grind them finely once more, return them to the cauldron, and refine them for another round by the same method. After removing them, grind them finely again and place them in a "he" (合, a lidded vessel) to continue the nurturing. In this round, the "mother" (母, the material that serves as the base ingredient during refining) is no longer needed.

The firing for the second seven-day round is as follows: on the first day, two liang; on the second day, two and a half liang; on the third day, three liang; on the fourth day, two and a half liang; on the fifth day, four liang. On the sixth day, use four liang in the morning and four liang in the evening. On the seventh day, use five liang in the morning and six liang in the evening. Two liang are placed on top of the cauldron and four liang around its sides. In total, from beginning to end, three jin of charcoal are used. At the end, take out the materials, grind them finely and place them in the cauldron, refine them for another round by the same method, grind them finely once more, and put them back in the cauldron to continue the nurturing, replacing the charcoal with fresh charcoal.

The firing for the third seven-day round is as follows: on the first day, two liang; on the second day, three liang; on the third day, four liang; and on the fourth, fifth, and sixth days, five liang each day. On the seventh day, perform the "duan" (缎, a refining step named in the original text). Pound three jin of powdered incense together with two charcoal briquettes until fine, and place the mixture around the cauldron. Heat it with six liang of charcoal over a gentle fire. After arranging the materials in the five directions (east, south, west, north, and center), cover the cauldron with four roof tiles, leaving an opening at the top for the smoke to escape. After three days, when the furnace has cooled, take out the materials. They can then serve as the furnace and casket (lugui), used for nurturing and refining the female and male powders (cixiong fen).

One turn of transformation.

For every one liang of powder, first boil it in lotus-ash decoction for a day. Then mix white-friend powder (baiyou) with water and coat the powder grains one by one with it, and stir-fry them together with calamus powder for about a day. Take them out and remove the white-friend coating, then grind the powder fine. Add half a liang of "Barefoot" (chiliaojiao) and grind them together into a powder, then mix it with one liang of silver powder and process it according to the method for forging powder described earlier.

Put the resulting powder back into the Silver Chamber. Again mix white-friend powder with water, coat the grains one by one, and stir-fry them with calamus powder for about a day. Take them out, remove the white-friend coating, and grind the powder fine. Add half a liang of "Barefoot," grind into powder, mix with one liang of silver powder, and process as before. Afterwards, put the powder into the Silver Chamber once more, cover and cushion it with the earlier cabinet (kui), and nourish it with fire for forty-nine days. Each qian of this powder is said to transmute one liang of bone, making it thoroughly translucent and fine-grained, without exceeding the bounds of the lead pool.

Second Transformation

Following this method, refine cinnabar mercury into powder frost. As before, boil the silver mother in lotus-ash decoction, then forge and nourish it in the Silver Chamber. For every liang of nourished cinnabar mercury, add four qian of male material and two qian of female material, and grind them evenly. Use the Geng mother to make the spirit chamber, and place the female and male materials inside to be nourished with fire. Use the Elixir of the Four Sages as the outer cabinet, with the fire set at four liang, for twenty-one consecutive days, changing the fire morning and evening. When the period is complete, extinguish the fire and let it cool, then take out the female and male powder. Each qian is said to transmute one liang of silver, refining it into silver of the highest grade.

Third Transformation: Qian Mercury

Place the nourished female and male powder into the Gold Chamber. Take large, bright, granular cinnabar and first boil it for three double-hours in a decoction of mulberry sap prepared with gallbladder-treated sulfur. Take it out and drain it, wrap it in gold leaf, bury it in the female and male powder, and place all of it together in the Gold Chamber. Use the Elixir of the Four Sages as the outer cabinet, seal it firmly, and nourish it with fire for forty-nine days, gradually raising the fire from two liang to six liang. When the period is complete, take out the cinnabar. One qian of it is said to dry-transform four liang of mercury, refining it into gold of the highest grade.

The Six Spirits Cabinet

According to this passage, first pound purslane (machixian) and willow leaves to extract their juice, and use it to boil and refine the ingredient for five days, then wrap it in a ball of grass. Then, for every two liang of the ingredient, add two liang each of pinellia (banxia) and aconite (caowu), layering them as a covering, and calcine the whole over fire. Fill a scallion tube with milk, insert it into a lotus-root hole, seal both ends with clay, and continue calcining over fire. Take one liang of borax and add the dregs settled from a cup of white wine, boiling until the powder is fully dissolved. Then boil it together with gardenia (shanzhizi), asarum (xixin), leigang, and trichosanthes (gualou) for five to seven days. Finally, wrap it with Sichuan langdu, pomegranate rind, guijiu, gallnut (wubeizi), and pyrrosia (shiwei), and calcine it.

Take four liang of the powder above and combine it with one liang of each of the other ingredients. Grind them until the powder blends with the milk, then place the mixture in a he (a vessel used for sealing and refining medicinal substances). Add a cup of qingyou (literally "dragonfly oil," probably a corrupted term) and nurture-refine it for seven days at the heat the text describes, with the fire measured at two liang. Take it out, add another cup of qingyou, and nurture-refine for seven more days, raising the fire to three liang. Take it out, add oil, and nurture-refine once more for seven days, raising the fire to four liang. In total this is twenty-one days of nurturing and refining, and the resulting substance serves as the "cabinet" (kui, a medicinal cabinet for holding and nurturing substances).

Take seven liang of the powder and combine it with seven liang of mercury, adding two liang of "mother" (mu, a term from the original whose meaning is unclear), and refine it into a sand-like substance. Grind it finely together with the powder, set it in a cool, shaded place to warm and nurture it, then take it out and divide it into granules or lumps. Carry it close to the body, place it in the cabinet described above, and nurture-refine it for twenty-one days by the "lotus-planting method," with the heat at roughly two to three. Half a qian of this powder can transmute one liang of base material, and it is called "Danyang" (Cinnabar Yang).

Transformation of the Solitary Foundation Cabinet

Boil half a jin of "pi" with Sichuan langdu for two double-hours. Then take half a jin of wutonglü and grind it together with the "pi" into a juice until it turns jade-green. After grinding it finely, place it in the furnace and nurture-refine it for seven days. When its color turns snow-white, it can be used for transmutation and as a cabinet for nurturing other substances.

One-Touch Gold

Refine with vitriol juice until the substance turns jade-green, grind it finely, and place it in the furnace to nurture-refine for seven days. When its color turns snow-white, it can be used for transmutation and as a cabinet for nurturing other substances.

The original text contains many suspected erroneous or variant characters, such as tao, duan, hui, qingyou, pi, and guijiu. Some drug names and heat-control terms also cannot be determined from this passage alone, so the related content is retained as in the original or interpreted with caution.

Pu alum (蒲矾), 2 liang; yellow alum (黄矾), 5 liang; tonglü (桐律), 2 liang; paoxiao (炮), 1 liang; green salt (青盐), 1 liang; Jie salt (解盐), 1 liang; orpiment (雌黄), 2 liang; and petroleum (石油), half a liang.

Wrap these ingredients in immortal's herb (仙人草) and heat them once, until they melt into a liquid. When opened, the result should be bright and lovely. Grind it with paper mulberry sap into pellets the size of a crossbow pellet, wrap them in gold leaf, and place them in the aforementioned kui (匮, the vessel used for heating and nurturing) to be nurtured for one day, or alternatively for three days. Take them out and grind them finely into powder, then form pills the size of a chicken's head with yellow beeswax. When using them, take four or five qian and combine them with one pill of elixir. This can transmute the elixir so that it reveals twelve parts of true color; if prepared in the proportion of three to seven, the effect is especially good.

The An Method

Take equal amounts of niter, white alum, rock salt, and eel powder. Blend them with bittern and calcine them, and the color will appear.

Another Method

Immortal's herb, croton seed, Chinese gallnut, stemona root, drynaria rhizome, Sichuan aconite, wild aconite, pinellia tuber, and arisaema tuber.

Nurturing the Powder

For every eight qian of powder, combine two qian of true mercury and two qian of "mother." Once it has coagulated into cinnabar sand, grind it into a paste and form it with paper mulberry sap into pills the size of a longan fruit. Then wrap them in mother foil, place them in the kui, and nurture them for forty-nine days (seven times seven days). One qian can then transmute one liang of "Danyang" elixir (丹阳).

Nurturing the Cinnabar

For every liang of raw cinnabar, use one biao of raw pi (生毗) as the inner layer (the original text appears to be corrupted or missing characters here, and the meaning is unclear). Then wrap it tightly with two liang of "two-eight mother sand" (二八母砂), place it in the aforementioned kui, and heat and nurture it for twenty-one days (three times seven days), and a precious substance can be refined. One qian can also transmute one liang.

Nurturing the Paoxiao and Gall

For every two qian of paoxiao, combine eight qian of gall. After nurturing them together, one liang of powder frost (粉霜) is obtained. Grind the powder frost finely together, place it at the bottom of a box, and separate it with gold leaf. Then press down on the top with the aforementioned kui and nurture it for fourteen days (two times seven days), or alternatively for only seven days (one time seven days). Afterward, two qian can be used to transmute one liang of "Gengdao" (庚道).

Nurturing Realgar and Orpiment

Take four qian of orpiment and six qian of realgar, grind them into powder, form them with honey into pills the size of a longan fruit, and wrap them in gold leaf. Then take one liang of the cinnabar previously nurtured, grind it finely, and wrap it around the outside. Place it in the kui and nurture it for twenty-one days (three times seven days). One qian can transmute one liang, turning white into yellow.

Cinnabar-poured sprouts and the Four Spirits kui sprouts: the nurtured cinnabar is made into a sprinkled preparation.

Four liang of cinnabar (zhusha) are boiled for three days together with large houttuynia (yuxingcao) and fo-ti (heshouwu). After one round of refining, it is placed in the "Mother" (mu) and nurtured and refined for one month, at which point it is called a "completed treasure." The fire phasing is kept at four liang throughout.

The cinnabar is formed into a lump, and two liang of mercury are poured over it, after which the fire is nurtured for one month. The fire phasing increases in stages of six days each: the first stage is textually damaged but seems to read "eleven liang"; the second stage is three liang, the third four, the fourth five, and the fifth six. The total fire amounts to one hundred and twenty liang. Two more liang of mercury are then poured over it, and the fire is nurtured for another month by the same method, with the fire phasing again increasing in the sequence above. One more liang of mercury is poured over it and refined for a month in the same way. All of this refining is done with fire in the upper part and water in the lower part. The pouring and refining are repeated in this manner until the mercury totals five liang. The material is then moved into a water-and-fire cauldron (shuihuo ding), and one more liang of mercury is poured over it and refined for a month by the same method; this pouring and refining continues for seven days. Next, one liang of cinnabar is added, and the fire is again nurtured for a month by the same method, repeated until nine rounds are completed. Further cinnabar is then added, and the fire is nurtured for yet another month. All of this refining is done with water in the upper part and fire in the lower part. After nine rounds of pouring and refining in total, it is said that ten liang of "Yellow Sprout" (huangya) can be obtained. When the nine months are complete, the embryo is shed in the tenth month and then placed in the "Four Divine Cabinet" (si shen kui) for further refining.

The Method of Refining the "Four Divine Cabinet"

Realgar (xionghuang) is calcined with mugwort until it becomes what is called "dead" matter, and is then nurtured and refined until it is thoroughly "dead." It is then boiled with wild mint. Orpiment (cihuang) is likewise calcined and nurtured until "dead." Sulfur (liuhuang), boiled with rhododendron flowers (zhizhu hua) and "Unstartled Herb" (weijing cao), is then added and nurtured until "dead"; after that, cinnabar boiled with the aforementioned herbs is added, and they are nurtured together until "dead." The "sprout" (yazi) refined earlier is then placed in two liang of true mercury, wrapped in the "Mother," and set in the "Chamber" (shi). The sprout is placed in the Four Divine Cabinet and nurtured for one month, with the days counted from the first to the fifteenth and then from the fifteenth back to the first, so that the original number of days is completed in full. The sprout is taken out and formed into a cabinet; cinnabar wrapped in gold leaf is placed inside and nurtured, then wrapped again in the "Mother" and set in the "Chamber." The sprout is placed into the Four Divine Cabinet and nurtured for one month, with the days counted from the first to the fifteenth and then from the fifteenth back to the first. When the days are complete, the sprout is taken out and formed into a cabinet; cinnabar wrapped in gold leaf is placed inside, and the fire is nurtured for seven times seven, or forty-nine, days. A passage on the fire phasing is missing, and may read "four to eight zhu"; after this, the material can be used for "sprinkling" (santi).

Sulfur and mercury are used as a cabinet to nurture realgar, which is said to transmute it into gold.

Note: The original text contains several passages that appear corrupted, omitted, or duplicated, such as "fire phasing, one, six days, 11 liang," "fire totals one hundred and twenty liang," and "four to eight zhu." The translation above follows the existing wording literally. Terms such as "Mother," "Chamber," "dead," and "Yellow Sprout" are ancient alchemical terms whose precise meanings must be judged in light of the rest of the book.

First, take ten liang of sulfur that has already been refined into "dead sulfur" (sulfur that has been fire-refined and made stable in nature) and wrap it layer by layer in three liang of thick gold foil. Nourish it over a steady fire for seven days, so that the sulfur is completely refined into dead sulfur. Then add raw sulfur and continue nourishing and refining it together with the finished dead sulfur to make the "gui" (a vessel, or inner lining, used to seal and refine medicinal substances).

Next, take mother cinnabar (a raw material used in alchemy) and refine it into a sprout-like form, heating it in stages according to the fire phasing. On the first day, use two liang of fire per liang of material; on the third day, use four liang; on the fifth day, use three liang; on the sixth and seventh days, use four liang, or alternatively six liang. Take out the sprout-like substance, cover it with sulfur, and nourish it over fire for another fourteen days, until it is completely refined into a "dead sprout." Then combine it with sulfur in equal amounts to make the "womb gui" (taigui), which is used to nourish and refine one liang of gengsha.

The gengsha must first be wrapped closely in a powder of chalcanthite (blue vitriol) that has been prepared with cinnabar, then placed inside a plum pit and nourished over fire for seven days, with the fire phasing following the method described above. After it is taken out, boil the xiong (realgar) counterpart first in white water with chalcanthite for one day, and then in green vitriol for half a day. Take it out and grind it together with the finished dead gengsha, add a small amount of the prepared substance, and bind it with honey into pills. Nourish it over fire for another fourteen days, with the fire phasing as follows: two liang on the first and second days; three liang from the third to the fifth day; four liang from the sixth to the tenth day; five liang on the eleventh and twelfth days; and on the thirteenth day, boil it for a further half day. After it is taken out, grind it together with the dead gengsha, add a small amount of the prepared substance, and bind it with honey into pills. Nourish it over fire for another fourteen days, with the fire phasing as follows: two liang on the first and second days; three liang from the third to the fifth day; four liang from the sixth to the tenth day; five liang on the eleventh and twelfth days; and six liang on the thirteenth and fourteenth days. After it is taken out, use two qian to transmute one liang of "sacred silver" until it turns yellow.

The Method of Sacred Silver

Nourish numinous cinnabar (lingsha) with sulfur so that it becomes silver.

The above describes the steps for preparing and transforming the Gengdao.

Pao (here likely referring to a prepared material or drug used in refining; the original text does not specify) may be used in any quantity. First boil one portion in plantain juice, then stir-fry it dry. Place fritillary bulb (beimu) and anemarrhena (zhimu) in a black pot, and also scatter the powder of these two herbs in the pot. When smoke rises, add the Pao material and fan it vigorously thirty to fifty times until it melts into liquid; the refining is then complete. This can be used to nourish and refine the female and male stone gall (an alchemical mineral material), and then to further refine Geng cinnabar.

The female and male stone gall are boiled in tianzhi vegetable for the three hottest periods (about forty days). The stone gall is then boiled separately in centipede grass (ebushicao) for one day, ground to a powder with milk, and shaped into honey pills the size of soybeans. These are placed in the kui described above (a vessel for holding the materials, used for sealed nourishing and refining) and nourished over fire for twenty-one days, whereupon the medicine is perfected within the kui. Combined with the Pao material and refined into an embryo, it is called the "Primal Yang Kui" (Yuanyang kui), and is used to nourish and refine Geng cinnabar. Four liang of each of the four materials are taken as the contents of the kui.

Cinnabar is boiled in river red knotweed for seventy days, wrapped tightly in gold leaf, and placed in the aforementioned kui, where it is nourished over fire for seven days. Two qian of this cinnabar can transmute one liang of ordinary silver into pure gold. To make superior cinnabar, one must blend it using the "three-seven proportion" (sanqi gou; a term for a ratio or method as given in the original): one liang of cinnabar to two qian of mother foil.

The Method of the Mandarin Duck Geng Mother Cinnabar

In nourishing and refining Geng mother cinnabar, whether the three-seven or the four-six proportion is used, two qian of cinnabar are drawn from the cinnabar to transmute one liang of ordinary silver into pure gold. To make superior cinnabar, one must use the three-seven proportion: one liang of cinnabar to two qian of mother foil.

The Method of the Mandarin Duck Geng Mother Cinnabar

In nourishing and refining Geng mother cinnabar, whether the three-seven or the four-six proportion is used, true mercury is extracted from the cinnabar and first combined with an equal amount of silver mother, then coagulated into cinnabar. It is placed in a cauldron (ding) and left to be nourished empty for seven days, after which the mercury is forced out. Gentian (longdancao), kava-like "mang" herb (mangcao), turmeric root (yujin), and red pine resin are ground into powder; half is spread on the bottom of the pot, the Geng material is placed on it and mercury is poured over it, and the other half of the powder is spread on top. The mouth of the pot is sealed with paper, and the contents are slowly simmered over fire, fanned from time to time. After a day, the cinnabar grains are taken out, and only then are they used as material placed close against the body in the kui for nourishing and refining.

Transformations of the Geng Way

Take out the "sprout seed" (the refined substance mentioned earlier) and, following the original method, nurture it with very light smoke and no direct fire. Then boil and refine it as usual until it becomes firm and fully matured. Next, use a silver vessel as the inner chamber and place the sprout inside, with "dead lead" (lead that has been refined) as the outer enclosure. Nurture it over fire for forty-nine days, then take out the sprout.

For every eight taels of sprout, add two taels of true mercury and grind them together into a powder. Then make a vessel from twelve taels of "geng" (here, a metal material used in alchemy), place the sprout inside, and use sulfur as the outer enclosure. Nurture it over fire for forty-nine days. Take out the sprout, grind it finely, and add another two taels of true mercury. Afterward, place it in the gold chamber and continue nurturing it over fire, accumulating the product gradually until it reaches one catty. This is called the "Great Dragon-Tiger Elixir." It can serve as an outer enclosure for nurturing the "Four Spirits of Cinnabar."

Take four taels of bright, lustrous cinnabar and first boil it in mulberry juice for three double-hours. Then add rice vinegar and prepared blue vitriol (chalcanthite), and boil and refine them together until the flames die away. Place the result in the gold chamber and nurture it over fire, accumulating it gradually until it reaches one catty. This is called the "Great Dragon-Tiger Elixir," and it can serve as an outer enclosure for nurturing the "Four Spirits of Cinnabar." This passage appears twice in the original text.

Wrap each grain of cinnabar in gold leaf, attach the prepared blue vitriol to the outside, and place it under the cover of the Dragon-Tiger enclosure made earlier. Nurture it over fire for twenty-one days. Once the cinnabar has been refined to the state called "truly dead and turned to liquid," it can be used to refine the "Three Yellows" and produce the "Four Spirits Elixir."

Take two taels of each of the Three Yellows and boil them in mulberry juice for five double-hours. Then add the four taels of cinnabar obtained earlier and grind everything evenly. Separately, take twelve taels of fresh "geng" and make a vessel from it. Place the Four Spirits inside, use the Dragon-Tiger Elixir as the outer enclosure, and put it all in the gold chamber. Seal it tightly and nurture it over fire for one month. According to the original text, once the appropriate fire phase is reached, forge it once more with three catties of fire. After the furnace has cooled, take out the contents. When all Four Spirits have turned purple, stop applying fire.

The original text then says that each qian (a tenth of a tael) of this elixir can transform one tael of mercury into dry solid, yielding top-grade "purple-polished gold." If nurtured over fire for three months, each qian can transform four taels of mercury. If nurtured for a full year, each qian can transform forty taels of mercury. The earlier Dragon-Tiger enclosure can also be used to nurture blue vitriol. After the fire is stopped, this can be used to transmute ordinary silver into top-grade gold.

The Embryonic Breathing (Taixi) Method

In the first stage, the pouring is done once every seven days. Take four liang of elixir base and pour in one liang of true mercury. Once it is sealed, nurture it over gentle fire for seven days. Use two liang of fire on each of the first and second days, two and a half liang on the third, two liang on the fourth, and one liang on each of the fifth, sixth, and seventh days. At the top, seal with two liang and insert for seven days. Then pour in another liang, with the firing phases as before. Pour three times in this way, for twenty-one days in all.

In the second stage, the pouring is done once every five days. The firing phases run as follows: one liang on the first day, two liang on the second, two and a half liang on the third, and two liang on the fourth. On the fifth day, at the Chou hour, seal the top with two liang and insert for seven days. Then pour in another liang, with the firing phases as before. Pour three times in this way, for twenty-one days in all.

In the third stage, the pouring is again done once every five days. The firing phases run as follows: one liang on the first day, two liang on the second, two and a half liang on the third, and two liang on the fourth. On the fifth day, at the Chou hour, seal the top with two liang and insert. Repeat this ten times, for fifty days. Together with the preceding seventy-one days, this makes one hundred and twenty-one days.

In the fourth stage, the pouring is done once every three days. The firing phases run as follows: on the first day, two liang, with the materials added at the Mao and You hours. On the second day, three liang, added at the Zi and Wu hours. On the third day, three liang, added at the Yin and Shen hours. Pour twenty times in this way, for sixty days, making one hundred and thirty-one days in all. After this, the pouring is changed to once a day, which is called "sown at dawn, harvested at dusk." The firing phases are gradually strengthened, but they must still be kept gentle.

Sulfur Severs Spirit Cinnabar and Turns It to Gold

Refine spirit cinnabar from sulfur, then nurture it with gold over a long period of seven days, and place it in a large cauldron to be smelted over a strong fire. Nurture and refine in this way through seven times seven, or forty-nine, cauldrons, carried out in seven rounds, with the gold replaced each time. Through these steps, the sulfur takes on a golden color. For each liang of spirit cinnabar, add two qian of sulfur and a little red ochre (a hematite-type mineral), and grind them together. Press niter and salt over the top and burn for one round over a strong fire. It is said that this yields seven qian of red gold, which becomes a precious object.

The Boxed Gold Method

Next, take five qian of pure gold and five qian of pure silver, and melt them together into molten metal, then hammer it into sheets or blocks. Then shape pieces of roof tile to match it in length and size. The original text breaks off at the character "先" ("first") at this point, and the remaining steps are missing, so the procedure cannot be determined.

The Alloy Method (Hejin fa)

Take five qian of pure yellow gold and five qian of pure white silver, melt them together into a liquid, and then hammer the alloy into thin sheets or small pieces. Separately, take a roof tile and shape it according to the length and size of the object to be processed. First lay down a layer of medicinal material about one fen thick, place the gold-and-silver pieces on top, cover them with a slightly thicker layer of the medicinal material, and then cover the whole with the tile. Seal the surroundings with clay to form an enclosing wall, and place it in the furnace: put a few pieces of fire at the bottom and press the furnace floor flat, then set the tile-covered piece in place and arrange a few glowing red charcoals evenly on top. Fan the fire, and when the tile turns faintly red, stop fanning and cover it with hot ashes. After roughly seven or eight shichen (double-hours), take it out, wash it clean with water, and then treat it according to the "stripping method" (bo fa). The "stripping method" is another processing step mentioned in the original text, which is not explained in detail here.

Take one liang of "huahan" and one liang of "qidanfan" (vitriol). First rinse the huahan in half a cup of water, removing grit and sediment; then place it in a tile cup on a small wind furnace and simmer it slowly over a gentle fire. When the water is hot, gradually add the vitriol and continue simmering until dry. Take it out, grind it fine, and treat it according to the "stripping method."

Grind salt, alum, saltpeter, shidan (chalcanthite), green vitriol, and yellow vitriol into a fine powder, place it in an earthenware vessel, and mix it with vinegar into a thick paste. Using a chicken feather, dip into the paste and brush it onto the object, then roast it over the fire, scrape it off, grind it fine, and treat it according to the "stripping method." Afterward, again grind these same ingredients fine, mix them with vinegar into a thick paste, brush it onto the object and roast it, and then plunge it into water; repeat this three or four times.

The Method of the Close-Fitting Cinnabar (Tieshen zhusha fa)

First, take white honey (bee honey), mix it with one and a half cups of water, and boil it over a fire in an earthenware vessel until the honey water becomes thick and well blended. Drip a little of the honey into a white vessel, then add the cinnabar and stir until the surface of every piece is coated with honey. Next, pour the cinnabar back into the white vessel and gently wipe the vessel with soft paper, so that only a thin layer of honey water remains on the surface of the cinnabar.

Then make a small booklet from paper and lay a sheet of processed paper (softer paper that has been worked and prepared) over it. Using pointed chopsticks, pick up the cinnabar piece by piece and arrange it evenly on the paper. Cover it with another sheet of processed paper and the "close-contact medicine" (herbs that touch the cinnabar directly). Afterward, gently shift the close-contact medicine with your hand so that it lies evenly, then dry it over heat, wrap it in paper, and let it cool.

Once cooled, place the material into the "mother compound" (the mother medicine that is combined with the cinnabar in refining) and carry out the "robbing of the cinnabar" (a refining step in which the cinnabar is enveloped and treated with medicinal substances), spreading it evenly on the paper. Again cover it in turn with processed paper and the close-contact herbs, shift them evenly by hand, dry them over heat, wrap them, and wait for them to cool.

Finally, divide the mother compound into five portions, placing two beneath and three above. Regulate the heat according to the "Azure Metal method" (the heat specifications of another refining method). When boiling the cinnabar, use Huai pepper (prickly ash from the Huai region) and tangerine leaves.

Take five qian of the "mother" (the substance that serves as carrier in alchemy) and two qian of mercury, and place them together in a ganguo crucible (the crucible used for alchemical refining). Cover the surface with oil and heat over a gentle fire, refining until the mercury forms mercury sand and the mother melts. When the mother has melted away by one to two qian, remove the vessel and scrape out the mercury sand. Once the mother is removed, the mercury sand should weigh three and a half qian.

Wrap the mercury sand tightly in sturdy paper and add half a liang of already-refined mercury. Keep only half a qian of the mother and set the rest aside. The refined mother weighs four and a half qian, and it can afterwards be used in separate batches to refine more than twenty liang of mercury, taking two and a half liang as the standard for each batch.

Next, put the half liang of mercury cinnabar obtained earlier into a guaguo pot, add one and a half qian of the medicinal substances, and stir-fry them until they become "green gold." Then add half a qian of "gold sprout," half a qian of "female," and half a qian of grass-subdued cinnabar, and stir-fry all together until the ingredients are blended and fused. After they have emulsified, stir-fry them briefly a little longer. Then roll a strip of bamboo into a ring about four qian in size.

Moisten the medicinal mixture with rice water and place it inside the ring, with coarse paper underneath. Press it firmly from above with a pestle until it dries. Then grind one and a half liang of shanze into a fine powder to serve as bedding and covering for the mixture. Lay two layers of paper beneath and seal the top with three layers, so that the medicinal layer is about four fen thick, and then apply heat.

Increase the fire day by day. On days one to three, use one liang and two qian of fire. On days four to six, use one liang and three qian. On days seven to nine, use one liang and four qian. On days ten to twelve, use one liang and five qian. On days thirteen and fourteen, use one liang and six qian.

When the time is up, take the vessel out and chisel a grain the size of a rice kernel from the green gold. Place it over a fire and blow-refine it. If it no longer gives off flame and forms a bead, this shows it has separated from the mother. Place the green gold in a sealed vessel and "nourish it in emptiness" for ten days (continuing to warm and nurture it with a gentler fire), then blow-refine it again to check. It is ready once it no longer gives off flame. If flame still appears, continue the nourishing in emptiness.

Then take seven qian of the finished elixir head and stir-fry one and a half liang of the mother mercury previously refined, following the earlier method. Add the elixir head, emulsify the two together, and stir-fry briefly. Divide the mixture into two cakes and warm-nourish them in two sealed vessels with seven liang of shanze. Increase the fire gradually from one liang and four qian, and stop when it reaches two liang. After fourteen days, take them out and blow-refine to check. If they have become white silver cinnabar, nourish them in emptiness for another ten days.

After that, stir-fry two liang of the finished green gold together with eight liang of mother mercury refined by the original method. Divide it into five cakes and warm-nourish them in five sealed vessels. For each vessel, use six liang of shanze, and increase the fire gradually from one liang and six qian, stopping once it reaches two liang and two qian. After fourteen days, take them out and divide them into two sealed vessels for a further half month of nourishing in emptiness. Only at this stage may the medicine be tested.

First, remember the method for making the "Mother Furnace" (mu fang zao): it is used to smelt and refine the "Mother Mercury."

Making the Mother Furnace

Twist the mother paper tightly and let it dry, then place it in a ganguo (a crucible used in alchemy) with a capacity of fifty liang. Seal the mouth of the crucible with paper, and then apply fire to drive out the mercury. Afterward, wrap it in two or three layers of mother-basin paper, coat the outside with a ball of yellow clay three to four fen thick, and bury it in gentle fire to simmer for a whole night. The next day, remove the yellow clay and place the crucible in a wind furnace, setting it inside together with the vessel that holds the smoke, ready for use.

Cinnabar, Sour Juice, and Plum Pits

Take eight liang of cinnabar, and prepare two large loads of triangular sour fruit, extracting from them two dou of their natural juice. Then take three jin of smoked plums (wumei) and decoct them to yield a little over one dou of juice. Suspend the cinnabar above the juice and refine it by water-bath heating for three fu-time periods (a traditional way of reckoning time, roughly thirty-six days), and then remove the plum pits.

Take eight liang of cinnabar and prepare two large loads of sanjiaosuan (three-cornered sorrel), extracting two dou of its natural juice. Separately, simmer three jin of smoked plum (wumei) to obtain a little over one dou of liquid. Suspend the cinnabar in this liquid and boil it for three days and nights, then remove it and let it drain dry. Next, treat it with naphtha (shinaoyou) or a prepared "cinnabar water," and coat the surface of the cinnabar with lodestone powder so that it becomes extremely hard.

Then take six liang of red gold and ten liang of mercury and simmer them in a strong infusion of Sichuan pepper until they coagulate into a sand. Boil this for a day in juice from goji (gouqi) shoots, remove the grains, return them to the pot, and grind them repeatedly until they are smooth and lustrous. For each liang of cinnabar, wrap it tightly in two liang of "mother sand" (musha), and leave it overnight in a clean place so that it sets.

Grind eight liang of hematite (daizheshi) very fine and soak it in vinegar until the vessel is seven or eight tenths full. Place it in a porcelain vessel and boil it, stirring evenly with a stick. Add four liang of "Fire Butterfly" (huohudie), which is iron bloom. Take another two liang of the finest genuine chalcanthite (danfan), suspend it in the vessel and boil it, slowly adding hot vinegar as it cooks, for half a day. Remove the Fire Butterfly, keep only the hematite and chalcanthite, and let them dry in the air.

Take one shanpu, a sealed vessel used for nurturing the fire, and first treat it with ginger juice. Then mix ink with egg white and coat the inside and outside of the shanpu with more than ten layers, until the coating is about as thick as a grain of rice. Next, using the four-ingredient mixture "Xiong-Dan-Zeng-Dai," again blended with egg white, apply more than ten further layers. Place the previously prepared mineral material and chalcanthite inside the shanpu as the "kui" (the container that encloses the ingredients and holds the fire). Then wrap the cinnabar in the mother sand and arrange it in the shape of a planted lotus. Cover and seal it firmly according to the method, and place it in an ash bed to nurture the fire for one month.

The fire phases follow the sequence "from one to fifteen, and from fifteen back to one," symbolizing the circulation of the Zhoutian (celestial cycle). In all, one hundred and forty liang of fuel are used. Throughout, the fire is nurtured by the Weiji method (the "Not Yet Complete" method). When the period is complete, remove the cinnabar and peel away the mother sand, and the so-called "treasure" will be visible inside.

Second Transformation of the Yellow Sprout.

First, take the Precious Cinnabar (baozhu) refined earlier and soak and wash it for one double-hour in a thick decoction made from the tender shoots of Golden Star Herb (jinxingcao, also called Guanzhong). Next, take the Puzi, mixing it into an ink-like paste with ginger juice and egg white; then use male-yang bile (yangxiongdan) in place of the five-flavor vinegar to prepare the Puzi. Place the cinnabar into the Puzi and proceed according to the method of pouring and drenching.

Each time, pour in four liang of mercury. During the hours of Zi, Wu, Mao, and You (four double-hours fixed by traditional numerological reckoning), visualize four liang of fire power to warm and nourish it, again employing the "Weiji" (Not Yet Completed) method. After three days, open it and examine it, taking great care not to disturb it, for the sprout of the medicine is still very tender. Then pour in a further three liang. On the fifth day, pour another four liang of mercury into the Puzi according to the drenching method, and again, during the hours of Zi, Wu, Mao, and You, visualize four liang of fire power to warm and nourish it, once more employing the "Weiji" method. After three days, open it and examine it, and again do not disturb it. Afterward, pour in another three liang; on the fifth or seventh day, perform the drenching once more. Repeat this three to five times in all, until a total of twelve liang has been poured in. Then open the vessel, remove the medicine sprout, and place it in a clean, pure chamber.

Third Transformation of the Purple Chariot (Zihe Che)

Take five liang of sturdy, hard-to-damage Mingxiong (realgar, a mineral drug of the cinnabar kind). Boil honey locust pods in strong vinegar, suspend the realgar in the liquid, and boil it for the length of the three fu periods. Then wash it clean and dry it in the air. Mix Yangdan Zengdai with egg white, coat the realgar with it, and roast it over rock naphtha until the substance is thoroughly cooked through. Prepared cinnabar (sha) may also be added. Next, wrap it tightly in gold leaf, then coat it with ink mixed with egg white, ten or more layers deep.

Next, place the "sprout" made earlier into the cinnabar and grind it into powder together with two liang of true mercury (the alchemical name for quicksilver). Take the mother cinnabar that has been peeled off and add five liang of red gold. Put the remaining materials into the furnace according to the original method and melt them into a liquid, then cast the result into a Shenshi (spirit chamber, a vessel for holding the alchemical ingredients). It may be shaped like a hen's egg, or made according to the method for making the Shapu. Wrap it tightly in gold leaf and coat it with ink mixed with egg white, again ten or more layers.

Divide the sprout made earlier into two halves. Lay one half at the bottom of the spirit chamber, place the realgar in the middle, and cover it with the other half. Bind it tightly with iron wire as prescribed, seal it firmly with clay, and then dip it in the glaze compound.

Then grind four liang of red salt and two liang of niter to a fine powder, add them gradually to a large Ganguo (crucible), and melt them in the furnace into a liquid. Pour this into a porcelain or stone vessel, grind it fine, and put it into the Shapu. Set the golden spirit chamber inside and seal it firmly. Place it in the ash bath and nourish it with a gentle fire. On the first day use one liang of fire, increasing it day by day until it reaches six liang on the sixth day. On the seventh day, change to the fire of six Yang. Refine it for forty-nine days in all. Take out the Shapu, suspend it in molten lead, and boil the two together for half a day. Then open the Shapu, remove the drug, and grind it all together finely.

Divide each liang of the powder into four hundred pills, preparing them with paper mulberry sap and wax. Take a plum pit and make a small hole at the plumper end of the pit. Remove the kernel, put in eight or nine fen of mercury, add one pill, and stop the opening with a willow-wood plug. Next, wrap the plum pit in several layers of paper (four or five) coated with a white Youjin preparation made from gold-covering earth, red ochre (daizhe), chalcanthite (shidan), alum, and fuxiao niter. Seal it with salt clay and place it in the Ganguo. Pack it with yellow clay and calcine it over a strong fire for a long time until it glows red, then plunge it into water. According to the original text, this transforms the mercury into gold.

"Method Clay" (fani) is a sealing clay, made from half a jin of earthworm soil, four liang of red halloysite, and two liang of minium. Another two liang of powdered rabbit-hair teacup (tuhao zhan) is added, and everything is pounded into a fine powder, then mixed evenly with "white friend liquid" (baiyou zhi) and beaten with a pestle more than ten thousand times. The clay is then used to seal together the "inner chamber" and the "outer chamber." Here, "inner chamber" and "outer joining" refer to the sealing points on the inside and outside of the refining vessel. The specific identities of the "white friend liquid" and the "rabbit-hair teacup powder" cannot be determined from this passage alone.

The "Glass Glaze Medicine" (maoli yao) is prepared by taking half a jin of lead-yellow flower (qianhuang hua), adding two liang of niter and two liang of borax, and melting them thoroughly into a liquid, which is then dipped or brushed onto the "Spirit Chamber" (shenshi) to seal it tightly. The "Spirit Chamber" is the enclosed space within the alchemical vessel where the medicinal substances are placed. The scripture (Jing) says that if one wishes to nourish the san (yangshen) and carry out the refining, one must seal in this way, so that no vital breath escapes and the transformations within the vessel can complete themselves.