《歷世真仙體道通鑑》Vol. 23

Du Bing, courtesy name Shugong, was from Qiantang in the state of Wu. When he was eighteen, he was playing with his companions outside the northern city gate. An old man called him over and said, “This boy has an extraordinary appearance. It is a pity that I am already old and may not live to see what he accomplishes.”

Du Bing lost his father at an early age and served his stepmother with great filial devotion. His reputation spread throughout the region. The authorities summoned him to serve as an official three times, but he declined each time. He lamented, “Now is a time when humans and ghosts intermingle and the world is in turmoil. Without the power of Zhengyi, the Way of Orthodox Unity, there is no way to hold things steady and secure.” He therefore became a disciple of Chen Wenzi of Yuhang, learning methods of Daoist governance and practice, and joined the Zhengyi tradition. He used these methods to heal the people with considerable success, and many came to follow him.

One night, a divine being descended and declared, “I am Zhang Zhennan. You are destined to transmit my methods, so I have come especially to pass them on to you.” The divine being taught him various secret methods and Daoist texts, and also transmitted the arts of Yangping zhi, a Daoist center of ritual administration. Whenever Du Bing entered a state of stillness and burned incense, he could see the fortunes and misfortunes that would befall people over the next three or five generations, and describe them clearly. His memorials to the heavens, talismans, and talisman-infused water often proved effective at once. People from near and far, including members of the Daoist community, flocked to follow him in great numbers. Within ten years, tens of thousands of households had become his followers and offered him rice.

Xie An, Grand Tutor of the Jin dynasty, was then serving as governor of Wuxing. After seeing a yellow-white radiance, he asked Du Bing about it. Du Bing replied, “Your ancestors accumulated hidden virtue, and its blessings have passed down to their descendants. You will eventually attain the highest rank among the ministers.”

Lu Na, the Director of the Secretariat, came from generations of officials. Near the end of his life, he often suffered from an illness that gradually grew worse. Lu Na had just passed the age of thirty when he suddenly received a memorial stating that he would face a great calamity but would survive it. Du Bing then gave him a recipe for Lingfei Powder. It is said that after taking the medicine, Lu Na lived to the age of seventy-nine.

When Sima Huan Wen was campaigning in the north, he asked Du Bing whether he would be victorious. Du Bing said, “Our army must not go. If it does, it will accomplish nothing. The enemy must not come; if it does, it will be utterly defeated. This is the moment for the general to risk his life and win distinction.” Later, when Huan Wen reached Fangtou, the Shimen passage could not be opened, the river had run dry, and provisions were exhausted. In the end, he was defeated by the Xianbei army. He said to his disciple Taoye, “It is a pity I did not listen to Master Du then. That is how I came to suffer this defeat.”

Before Fu Jian reached Shouchun, General of the Chariots and Cavalry Xie Xuan led troops against him and asked Du Bing who would win. Du Bing said, “Our army must not go; if it does, it will accomplish nothing. The enemy must not come; if it does, it will be utterly defeated. This is the moment for the general to risk his life.” Later, Fu Jian was indeed routed and fled.

Lu Song called himself a master and was usually surrounded by more than three hundred disciples. Du Bing told Huan Wen about him. Lu Song was actually the spirit of an old tree in Dongzhi, and he deceived and deluded the people. Before long, he would forcibly storm the palace…

…only after they are lacking does death occur. During the Xian’an era of Emperor Jianwen of Jin, Song led several hundred men and women into the palace in the middle of the night, claiming that the Duke of Haixi had been restored to the throne. Government troops immediately killed them. When Wen Fang heard this, he expressed admiration.

Later, Huan Chong wanted to recommend Bing’s son Gai for the post of assistant officer. Bing declined, saying, “My descendants all have short lives, and I do not want them to enter official service. It will not be until my great-great-grandson that my blessings will come to fruition.” Bing said, “After I die, someone will invoke my arts to undermine the Great Dao. But this will be only a minor disturbance, like the Yellow Turban Rebellion, and will soon be put down.”

He wrote these words on white silk, sealed it, and entrusted it to his wife, Lady Feng, instructing her: “If ominous signs appear, you may open this and show it to the children and nephews. They should cultivate De diligently and guard themselves with care.”

During the Long’an era of Emperor An, Sun Tai of Langya was convicted of using sorcery to mislead the people, and many others were implicated and suffered as a result. Bing suddenly began gathering people all day to revel without restraint, as though he could never get enough. He also sent the clerk Chong Taosheng to the market to buy funeral supplies, and told his family to make clothes and bedding. He said, “I will die at noon on the twenty-sixth day of the third month.” Later, he gradually began to feel unwell. On that day, he died quietly in his bedroom. His body remained supple, but his breath had ceased. Daoists and disciples throughout the region erected a stele for him and gave him the posthumous title “Illustrious Master.”

Zhu Ku

Zhu Ku’s place of origin is unknown. For a long time, he took “stone spring” and fasting talisman water, so that he felt neither hunger nor thirst, and his body stayed strong without aging. Zhu Ku suddenly announced that the time had come for him to become an immortal. He chose a day to depart and said farewell to his relatives and friends, telling them that someone would come to receive him. He wore only a single robe and a white lined jacket. Before long, two yellow cranes descended into the courtyard, and Zhu Ku died and ascended to immortality. Three more yellow cranes appeared in the courtyard and flew together toward the eastern outskirts. Three Daoist priests dressed in yellow walked eastward hand in hand. Zhu Ku asked a villager to carry a letter to his family. When they examined his body, they found only an empty shell.

Jiang Bozhen

Jiang Bozhen’s place of origin is unknown. As a young man, he was fond of Daoist arts. While gathering herbs on Meng Mountain, he happened to meet the immortal Shi Bozhen. Jiang Bozhen watched him in the midday sun. Seeing from behind him that Jiang’s thoughts were not upright, Shi Bozhen said, “Though you study diligently, you do not know that your thoughts are not upright. This is your failing.” He then taught him to take stone brain. Stone brain is mottled in color and soft in texture, and resembles small pebbles; it can be found in many places. After taking it for a long time, the body grows warm without becoming thirsty. Jiang Bozhen later attained the Dao and became an immortal. Fanyangzi also attained the Dao after taking stone brain.

Wang Ba

Wang Ba was a man of the Liang dynasty who ascended to immortality at Yishan in Sanshan, Fuzhou. Today, that place is Chongxu Palace, where there is also a Chinese honey locust tree said to have been left from his time. Wang Ba once engraved the secrets of alchemical refinement on a gold tablet…

Buried behind a mountain, it could still enable someone who dug it up to attain the Dao. Its formula says: “Gold is the essence of sand; the tooth is the root of lead. Once the main veins and their branches are understood, it can be used without error. After one cycle, the work is complete. Open the furnace, and only then will the finished product emerge, red and violet in color and shining brilliantly. Ground finely, it is like powder, with grains the size of sesame seeds. Take one pill each day; never increase the dose arbitrarily. This can transform the bones and turn the body to gold, restoring a youthful appearance. If you wish to use it to transmute ingredients into an elixir, one pill is all it takes: ten taels of dry mercury can be refined into horse-tooth.”

Later, Cai Junmo, a civil official of the Northern Song, left this poem:

The perfected one’s jade bones are light; borne on Qi, he ascends to the jade terrace.

Bending his head to look down at the world below, he sees every household enveloped in foul, dusty haze.

The incense has long since gone cold; mountains and rivers wander emptily, to no purpose.

Blue vines coil around old trees; purple moss grows over vacant graves.

The day stretches on; he sits quietly in repose. A fresh breeze rises, and he gives voice to a long chant.

Falling blossoms scatter like chess pieces; bees hover beside the wine cups.

On fine days, he often drinks to excess; the guests seated around him are truly treasured.

How difficult it is to reach the immortals! When will the Golden Tripod at last be opened?

Yuan Cangji

Yuan Cangji, a recluse of the Sui dynasty, once served as an adjudicator on a maritime mission. One day, caught in a storm, he clung to a piece of wood after his ship was wrecked and drifted to an island. The people there told him that it was Cangzhou, tens of thousands of li from the Central Plains and a thousand li across. The island’s flowers and trees flourished year-round as though it were always the second or third month. Most of its inhabitants lived forever. There grew a kind of melon with two stems, two chi long; its green dates and red chestnuts were as large as pears. The ponds held four-legged fish, and there were golden lotus flowers that women picked to wear in their hair. The islanders said, “Without a golden lotus, one cannot be counted among the immortals.”

Yuan Cangji suddenly longed for the Central Plains, so the islanders built him a Lingfeng boat—a vessel that sped swiftly on the wind—to take him home. It sliced through the water as fast as a flying arrow and reached Donglai in ten days. He asked which kingdom he had arrived in and learned that it was now the Tang dynasty. Two hundred years had passed between the Sui’s Daye era and the Tang’s Zhenyuan era.

Wang Rui

Wang Rui, a successful examination candidate, had read widely in the classics and histories and pursued his studies with great diligence. He tirelessly investigated questions that earlier scholars had left unresolved, arriving at insights that previous Confucian scholars had never discovered. He wrote the thirty-volume Zhu Gu Zi, in which he examined and corrected every flaw in the Six Classics and every error in the histories. Two of his essays explain his insights into metaphor; even the most far-sighted and perceptive figures of antiquity might not have surpassed them.

Wang Rui loved wine and took pleasure in his own company, unconstrained by worldly conventions. After drinking freely, he would always discuss principles with others and examine the finer points of writing. Like Liu and Ruan, he too had once criticized the ancients. But as he breathed in the dew and mountain mists, he grew chilled over the years, and his illness lingered without cure. Later, while traveling through Yan, he was on the road…

He met a man leaning on a cherrywood staff and wearing a palm-leaf hat. The man had the unusual, ancient appearance of a crane, quite unlike others of his age. His name was Xidao. Rui said to him, “Young man, are you troubled by three delusions? Why have you become so frail?” Rui explained the reason for his condition. Xidao replied, “I know the art of the furnace and cauldron. What illness could I not cure?” Rui then took him as his teacher and fasted for three days by the Zhang River. Afterward, Xidao taught him the secret instructions: “The essence of Wood is the heavenly soul; the liquid of Metal is the earthly spirit. In the movement of Kan and Li, which represent Water and Fire in Daoist internal alchemy, the gentle and the swift must be matched, without excess. The movements of Metal and Wood each follow their proper measure; only when Qin and Jin are joined is the balance right. The effects appear in as few as sixty days, or, at most, within three years.” He also composed a song:

“The faint spirit enters the soul, and Yin and Yang unite.

Yang energy warms and nourishes; Yin energy moistens and enriches; spirits and ghosts vanish.

A thousand songs and ten thousand praises have failed to express its mystery.

From ancient times to the present, the sun and moon turn without cease.

Receive the medicine’s power and refine it; after taking it through one full cycle,

illness will gradually be cured.”

After this, Xidao lived in seclusion, keeping to himself. He feigned wild behavior and mingled with the world. At the age of eighty, he died on the road at Pengshan. Those who knew him buried him. Before long, he appeared again in Chengdu and often stayed in Lewen County. At the time, wild beasts were especially dangerous, yet Rui would sleep out in the grass after drinking, neither seeking shelter in the woods nor feeling any fear. Perhaps he, too, was one of those who attain immortality through a transformation like a cicada’s molt.

Li Quan

Li Quan, whose courtesy name was Daguanzi, lived on Mount Shaoshi and was devoted to the Daoist way of the immortals. He often traveled among famous mountains, gathering a wide range of arts and methods. Once, at Tiger’s Mouth Cliff on Mount Song, he found the Original Scripture of the Yellow Emperor on the Hidden Talisman and the Plain Book. The scrolls were sealed with red lacquer and stored in a jade case. On the case was written: “On the seventh day of the seventh month in the second year of Tai Ping Zhen Jun of the Great Wei, the Shangqing Daoist Kou Qianzhi hid these in a famous mountain, to pass them on to one whose aims accord with his own.” The scrolls were badly worn. Li Quan copied and read them thousands of times, yet still could not understand their meaning.

Later, he traveled into Qin and met an old woman at the foot of Mount Li. Her hair was coiled on the crown of her head, with the rest hanging halfway down. Her clothes were worn, she leaned on a cane, and her appearance was extraordinary. Seeing a fire beside the road burning a tree, she remarked to herself, “Fire is born from Wood; when calamity takes hold, it will surely consume the Wood completely.” Li Quan asked in surprise, “Those are words from the Scripture of the Yellow Emperor on the Hidden Talisman. How can an old woman know them?” She replied, “I have upheld this scripture through three Yuan cycles and six cycles of the sexagenary calendar. Young man, where did you obtain it?” Li Quan bowed twice and explained in detail how he had come by the scripture.

The old woman said, “The bones of your cheek rise straight to the Gate of Life, and your Gate of Destiny is level with the Sun Corner. Your blood and energy, and your mental powers, have not yet declined; your thoughts are also free of distortion. You are virtuous and fond of the Dao, courageous and eager to learn. You are truly my disciple.”

She said, “When you reach the age of forty-five, you will encounter a great calamity.” With that, she took out a cinnabar talisman written on paper and threaded it onto the top of her staff, then had Li Quan kneel to receive it. The old woman sat on a rock and explained the meaning of the Yinfu to him:

“The Yinfu has three hundred characters: one hundred expound the Dao, one hundred explain the methods, and one hundred describe the techniques. The first section teaches the way of immortals embracing the One; the middle section teaches how to enrich the state and bring peace to the people; the final section sets out strategies for strengthening the military and defeating the enemy. These teachings arise from inward reflection while also corresponding to the affairs of the world. Their subtlety cannot be adequately explained even by the Huangting and the Bajing; their essential points cannot be fully set down in the scriptures, biographies, writings of the various masters, or histories. Even men as clever and resourceful as Sun Wu, Wu Qi, Han Xin, and Bai Qi would not be enough to make them seem extraordinary.

“Those who have not attained the Dao must not be allowed to hear this book. When a Perfected One puts it into practice, he can comprehend its Dao; when a worthy person puts it into practice, he can master its methods; when an upright person puts it into practice, he can learn its techniques. People differ in their understanding and in how much they can grasp. If you wish to transmit it to someone who shares your aspirations, first observe purification and abstinence, then pass it on. One with the foundations of a lineage may be the teacher; one without them should be the disciple. Do not value the rich and noble while looking down on the poor and lowly. To violate this rule is to have twenty cycles of one’s lifespan cut away. If a person recites it seven times on the day corresponding to their birth, it can increase their wisdom and lengthen their life. Copying one complete text each year on the seventh day of the seventh month and concealing it in a stone cave in a famous mountain can also add years to one’s life.”

After a long while, the old woman said, “It is late. I have some wheat porridge for you to eat.” She took a ladle from her sleeve and told Li Quan to fetch water from the valley. Once the ladle was full, it suddenly weighed more than a hundred jin, and Li Quan could not hold on to it; it sank into the spring. When he returned, the old woman had vanished, leaving only several sheng of wheat porridge. Li Quan ate it and never ate food again.

During the Kaiyuan era of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang, Li Quan served as deputy military commissioner of Jiangling and Censor-in-Chief. He had a talent for military strategy and wrote the ten-volume Taibai Yinjing, as well as the ten-volume Zhongtai Zhi. At the time, Li Linfu pushed him aside, and his official career did not advance. Later, he went into the famous mountains in search of Daoist arts, and after that no one knew what became of him.

Wang Kejiao

Wang Kejiao was from Kunshan in Suzhou. He was originally a farmer and ordinarily knew nothing of Daoist arts. When he was a few years old, five-colored light shone from his eyes, especially brightly at night; even in a dark room, he could see clearly. Someone told his relatives and friends, “This is an illness. When the light disappears, he will go blind.” His parents did not understand the cause, so they asked an ordinary doctor to treat him with moxibustion. The light in his eyes then disappeared.

In the eleventh month of the tenth year of the Xiantong era (869), during the reign of Emperor Yizong of the Tang, Ke Jiao was returning home from the market. As he passed the river, he saw a large boat. Golden brocade was draped around it, and it was adorned with pearls and jade. People aboard were making music and enjoying themselves. Ke Jiao stood watching on the bank, and the boat drew in and stopped. A boy in blue robes—a servant said in Daoist legend to attend immortals—led him aboard.

Ke Jiao saw more than ten people on the boat. They wore tall caps and feathered robes embroidered with brilliant clouds and landscapes, and each held a musical instrument. One of them sang, “Uncle Three-Three wants to see you.” Ke Jiao had no idea who they were. Another person nearby said, “He has the bones of an immortal, but fire has injured him, so he cannot yet drink wine. Only if he goes ten years without eating might he have hope of attaining the Dao.” That person gave Ke Jiao a chestnut to eat. Ke Jiao ate half and kept the other half in his hand.

Then music sounded aboard the boat, and everyone drank wine. The boy led Ke Jiao back to shore. Suddenly, Ke Jiao seemed to wake from a dream. The moment his foot touched land, he had already fallen beside a rock beneath a waterfall on Mount Tiantai. In the blink of an eye, he had crossed a thousand li over land and water.

Yuan Cong, the prefect of Taizhou, suspected a fraud and issued an order to investigate Ke Jiao’s home village. The inquiry established that thirty days had passed between the day Ke Jiao disappeared and the day he appeared on Mount Tiantai. After that, Ke Jiao stopped eating, yet his appearance became bright and radiant. Yuan Cong gave him feathered robes and a Daoist gown, and arranged for him to live at Ziji Palace.

Wang Feng, Censor-in-Chief and Inspector of Yuezhou, submitted a memorial saying, “It seems he heard the immortals’ music, ‘Xiaoshao,’ in heaven, then in the blink of an eye woke as if from a dream to find that thirty days had passed in the human world. Although ten years are said to be the appointed term, one cannot help fearing he may fly away in a single day.” The emperor issued an edict: “The deeds of immortals are all recorded in the classical texts, and accounts of wondrous events deserve to be told. Having listened carefully and made inquiries, we have learned that he has transcended the ordinary world. Moreover, he is in a famous mountain, as has been the case from ancient times to the present. How far away can Penglai and Yingzhou be? Order the officials of this circuit to care for him properly and let him live in seclusion, as Master Anqi did.” The court therefore allowed Ke Jiao to wander and rest in the mountains. Several years later, he was still in the Jiangnan region.

Chen Jian

Chen Jian was a minor official in Jinhua County, Wuzhou. One day, he arrived at the county office very early. The gate had not yet opened, so he waited outside, pacing back and forth. Suddenly he met a Daoist who was walking in great haste. Without realizing it, Chen Jian followed him for three or five li, until they suddenly came upon a temple complex with tall halls.

The Daoist led Chen Jian into a room furnished with a desk, brushes, ink, and other writing materials. He took out a roll of yellow silk and more than ten sheets of paper and handed them to Chen Jian. “I hear you are skilled at writing. Copy these for me.” Chen Jian opened the roll and saw that it was covered in ancient seal script. He had never known how to read seal characters, and…

This Daoist had never studied this method of cultivation and thought it would be difficult. Now that the Daoist had left, he had no other reason to refuse, so he tried practicing according to the instructions in the book. He found the method very easy and finished the practice in half a day.

The Daoist handed him a cup of broth and said, “This is the Divine Elixir of Jinhua. It is not something one can obtain casually. Drink it, and your lifespan will be limitless. It also tastes wonderfully sweet.” Tired from his practice, he thanked the Daoist and accepted it. The Daoist added, “Life in the world is difficult. If you ever need help, I will come again.” He then told him that this place was the Grotto-Heaven of Jinhua, an immortal realm from Daoist legend. When he stepped out of the cave, he felt as if he had just awakened from a dream and realized that three days had passed.

After returning home, he practiced seal-script calligraphy, and his brushwork became exceptionally strong. From then on, he no longer ate or drank. The prefect, Xian Zi, was preparing to receive registers—to accept Daoist registers and become a Daoist—and found the matter astonishing. He took it as an auspicious sign of an immortal’s manifestation and issued an instruction to the county office: “He has only just received the secret registers, yet such an auspicious sign has appeared. This is clearly a step toward awakening to the Dao, and surely a portent of his ascent to the Real.” Before long, he entered Jinhua Mountain again, and after that no one knew what became of him.

Lu Jun

The chancellor Lu Jun passed the jinshi examination and entered government service through his skill in policy essays. He served as a Gentleman of the Secretariat. Later, after falling ill, he requested an appointment outside the capital and became prefect of Junzhou. Once there, his illness gradually worsened. He grew thinner and thinner and did not wish to see anyone. He often rested alone in a retreat on the mountain behind the prefectural city. His attendants kept their distance, and no one dared approach unless he summoned them.

Suddenly, a man in ragged clothes climbed over the wall and came in. Lu Jun asked who he was and where he came from. The man replied that his surname was Wang and that he had come from the mountains. Lu Jun smiled and said, “So you are the Mountain Recluse Wang?” The man replied, “Your rank is exalted, and you have risen to the highest office beneath the sovereign. Yet your life is short, and calamity is near. That is why you have fallen ill with this lingering sickness. I have come especially to save you.”

There was no water in the mountain retreat, and Lu Jun was about to ask someone to fetch some for tea. The Mountain Recluse Wang stopped him, dipped his sash into the well, took out a pill, and wrung the water from the sash. He then gave the pill to Lu Jun and made this prediction: “Starting today, your illness will be cured in five days, and you will be healthier than usual. Three years from now, you will face a great calamity. Do as many good deeds as you can; help others and cherish all living things. When the time comes, I will return to meet you, in early summer.”

From then on, Lu Jun’s illness did indeed improve, and he had fully recovered within a dozen days. The following year, he resigned and returned to the capital, where he became a Salt and Iron Commissioner. One day in the fourth month, he suddenly saw the Mountain Recluse Wang by the roadside outside the eastern gate of Wuben. The man followed him to Lu Jun’s home and said when they met, “Your second allotted term this year is nearly at an end, and you will face a grave calamity. However, last year in Junzhou you overturned an unjust case and saved three people’s lives, so that calamity has passed. Still, within this month, in another three to five days…”

Although his illness was serious and he was already extremely weak, there was no need to worry. The next day, the mountain recluse sent two servants with ten thousand coins to distribute among the poor and sick at Dog’s Back Slope, then departed once more. He said, “At noon on the fifth day of the fifth month in the twenty-third year, you may send a Daoist to wait on the summit of Mount Wan. By then you will be serving in the Hanjin River region. Someone will give you Danhua (a miraculous elixir of the immortals). Be sure not to miss the appointed hour.”

After that, Lord Lu held one prominent post after another, and his career flourished. Later, he was appointed to command the Hannan garrison. The following year was the twenty-third year. When the appointed day arrived, he ordered the Daoist Niu Zhiwei to climb Mount Wan at noon on the fifth day of the fifth month. The mountain recluse was already there. He took out two Golden Elixirs and had Niu Zhiwei swallow them, saying, “You have the aptitude to cultivate the Dao, but you lack good deeds that build up hidden virtue, so you do not yet meet the rank of an immortal. From now on, you must continue your diligent cultivation.” He then took out ten Golden Elixirs and gave them to Lord Lu. “You will enjoy a long life. Do not slacken in your practice. When your allotted years in the human world have run their course, you will be able to return to the immortal palace on Penglai.”

The mountain recluse bowed farewell to Niu Zhiwei and then vanished in an instant. From then on, Niu Zhiwei lived into his eighties, yet still looked about thirty. When Lord Lu reached the age of ninety, his hearing and eyesight remained sharp, and his vitality had not waned. After he died, a wonderful fragrance filled the room.

Wang Zizhi

Wang Zizhi, courtesy name Xianmiao, claimed to be from Mount Gou in Henan. He often traveled between the capital and Luoyang. Local elders said that for fifty years, whenever they saw him, he always looked about forty; no one knew his true age. He enjoyed nourishing Qi, a Daoist practice for cultivating body and mind, and he also liked to drink wine.

When Chongying, a native of Langya, had just taken up his post as military governor of Puzhou, Wang Zizhi was living at the Purple Pole Palace within the official residence. Chongying treated him with great generosity. Knowing that he liked wine, he sent him two jars every day.

One day, as Wang Zizhi was going out, he met a woodcutter carrying a load of firewood at the palace gate. The man had an unusual appearance, and Wang Zizhi found him remarkable. He bought the wood and paid more than its worth. The woodcutter accepted the money without protest and turned to leave. Wang Zizhi sent someone to follow him and watch. The man went straight to a tavern, drank the wine there, and only then returned.

Later, the woodcutter came again and said to Wang Zizhi, “This wine really is good, but it is still nowhere near as fine as the wine brewed by the Shi family in Xie County. I just came from there. I only regret that I had no companion at the time, so I couldn’t drink my fill.” Wang Zizhi came down the steps, took his hand, invited him to sit by the stove, and asked, “Could you get some of the Shi family’s fine wine?” The woodcutter agreed. He drew a talisman with a cinnabar brush and placed it over the fire. The smoke…

While the matter was still underway, a young boy stood nearby attending to the woodcutter. The woodcutter told him, “Take these two wine flasks for your revered master and go straight to the Shi family to fetch wine. I’m waiting so I can let my master drink his fill.”

By dusk, it was already late and the gate had been shut. The boy said to Zizhi, “You can close your eyes now.” The woodcutter placed a hand on the boy’s head. The boy and the wine flasks passed through a crack in the gate and, in the blink of an eye, had reached Jie County to buy wine and returned. The woodcutter and Zizhi drank together. The wine was sweet, rich, fragrant, and exceptionally clear; nothing in the world could compare with it.

At midnight, the woodcutter said to Zizhi, “You’re already drunk. I’d like to invite a guest to sit beside you. Would that be all right?” Zizhi said, “Of course.” The woodcutter then wrote a vermilion talisman, using cinnabar, and placed it over the fire. In an instant, a strange fragrance filled the room. A dignified man with handsome features and a fine beard appeared. He wore a purple robe and held a court tablet. He bowed, took his seat, and the three of them drank together for a long while.

The woodcutter heated an iron skewer and touched it to the man in purple, saying, “You may go now.” By then, the eastern sky was already bright. The three rose and took their leave. The woodcutter said to Zizhi, “You know who that man was. Before long, you can go to the River Deity Temple and see him.” After the woodcutter had left, Zizhi passed by the River Deity Temple and saw that the person who had drunk with them the previous night was in fact a deity. The mark left by the iron skewer was clearly visible, just as proof of what had happened.

Later, Zizhi met the woodcutter immortal again, and the woodcutter immortal taught him further secrets of cultivation. Zizhi eventually became an earthly immortal, an immortal who, according to Daoist legend, attains the Dao while dwelling among humans.

Wang Kuo

Wang Kuo was a commoner. During the Xiantong era of Emperor Yizong’s reign in the Tang dynasty, he set out by boat from Jingzhu, intending to cross Lake Dongting. Strong winds forced the boat to moor at the foot of Mount Jun. He and several others searched along the shore for a path up the mountain and began to climb.

Suddenly, they smelled wine. Wang Kuo asked his companions, but they all said they could smell nothing. After a while, the scent grew stronger. There was a cave in the cliff beside the path. Puzzled, Wang Kuo went inside. After walking more than ten paces, he saw a hollow in a flat stone surface, filled with wine. He scooped some up in his hands and drank. It was exceptionally rich and delicious. After drinking about half a dou, he felt thoroughly refreshed, almost as if he were drunk, and sat down beside the hollow to rest.

Once he had partly recovered, he returned to the boat and told his companions what had happened. They hurried off to search for the place, but could never find it again. From then on, Wang Kuo was full of vitality and never fell ill. Gradually, he lost his appetite for the five grains, and later entered a famous mountain to study the Dao.

Later, while reading an immortal’s book, he found the words: “Mount Jun has celestial wine; drink it, and you can ascend to immortality.” The wine Wang Kuo had encountered was precisely this celestial wine.