Notes on Chinese materia medica / by Daniel Hanbury.

  • Hanbury, Daniel, 1825-1875.
Date:
1862
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Notes on Chinese materia medica / by Daniel Hanbury. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

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    we may understand Calomel also. The Chinese appear to have a correct notion of the use of calomel as a purgative, and they also employ it in the form of ointment in cases of ulcer, to cleanse and produce a free purulent discharge. E*# Choo-sha; ft® Tan-sha ; Cinnabar; Red Sulphuret of Mer- cury.— Pun-tsaou, tig. 23; Cleyer, Med. simpl., No. 177. This mineral has been regarded by the Chinese as the Philosopher's Stone, and most extravagant ideas have been entertained respecting it. The Rev. J. Edkins in a communication recently laid before the China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society* uas pointed out that alchemy was pursued in China long previous to its being known in Europe,—in fact, that for two centuries prior to the Christian era, and for four or more subsequent, the transmutation of the base metals into gold, and the com- position of an elixir of immortality, were questions ardently studied by the Chinese. It is moreover a matter of history that intercoui'se between China and Persia was frequent both before and after the Mahommedan conquest of the latter country; that embassies from Persia, as well as from the Arabs, and even from the Greeks in Constantinople, visited the court of the Chinese emperor in Shansi; that Arab traders settled in China, and that there was frequent intercourse by sea, between China and the Persian Gulf; that China had an extensive alchemical literature anterior to the period when alchemy was studied in the West. All these facts go to prove that that pseudo-science originated not with the disciples of Mahommed, but that it was borrowed by them from the Chinese. With regard to the Philosopher’s Stone, it is remarkable that while the alchemists of the West have spoken with doubt as to what it was, with the Chinese its identity appears hardly to have been questioned. That wonderful body which, when used as a chemical agent, was supposed to have the power of converting other metals into gold, and, when employed a3 a medicine, of conferring immunity from death, is, according to the writings of the Chinese alchemists, Cinnabar. Ko-hung, author of the Pau p'uh tsi p'ian, a work of the fourth century of undoubted genuineness, enumerates various mineral and vegetable productions possessing in different degrees the properties of an Elixir Vitce. Of the first of them, Cinnabar, he writes in terms thus translated by Mr. Edkins :— When vegetable matter is burnt, it is destroyed, but when the Tan sha, [Cinnabar] is subjected to heat, it produces mercury. After passing through other changes, it returns to its original form. It differs widely, therefore, from vegetable substances, and hence it has the power of making men live for ever, and raising them to the rank of the genii. He who knows this doctrine, is he not far above common men? In the world there are few that know it, and many that cavil at it. Many do not even know that mercury comes out of cinnabar. When told, they still refuse to believe it, saying that cinnabar is red, and how can it produce a white substance? They say also that cinnabar is a stone,— that stones when heated turn to ashes, and how then can anything else be expected of cinnabar? They cannot even reach this simple truth, much less can it be said of them, that they have been instructed in the doctrine of the • ******* genu. * 9 * The specimens of cinnabar which I have received are in small crystalline fragments and very pure. According to Kmmpfer,t both native and artificial cinnabar are exported from China to Japan, the artificial being used by the Japanese as a colour, and the native been employed in medicine. The same author tells us that in his time, the buying and selling of cinnabar was a monopoly of certain merchants, in virtue of letters patent granted by the emperor. * Transactions of the China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (Hong Kong), Part 5, 1855, f Hist, of Japan, Lond., 1727. Vol. i., p. 113-