Author: Cao Dongyi
Wang Qingren (1768-1831), a native of Yutian County, Hebei Province, lived in Yahongqiao, Yutian County. He worked as a wukusheng and later practiced medicine in Beijing, and was a famous doctor during the Jiaqing to Daoguang years, and in 1830 he completed the influential medical work "Correction of Medical Forest", which also laid a reliable foundation for the correct evaluation of his historical merits.
The medical scientists before Wang Qingren all believed in medical texts such as the Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic, and Zhang Jingyue, who was at the end of the Ming Dynasty, even proposed that the entire "Inner Classic" was the teachings of the sages, and the proverbs, "characters and words are pearls", are extremely precious. Why did the time of Wang Qingren take a one hundred and eighty-degree turn, and the classics had become old things with unclear organs, unclear organs, "ignorant of wrongdoing, and ruins for future generations"? What is his motivation and background for correcting the mistakes of the classics? Is he the embodiment of the spontaneous "correction" progress of TCM practitioners, or is it a passive act stimulated by Western medicine?
"Forbidden Religion" and "No Smoking" in the Wang Qingren Era
According to scholars, at the end of the Ming Dynasty, the Italian missionary Matteo Ricci came to China to preach. In practice, he explored a set of effective methods, that is, to knock on the door with scholarship, use Western science and technology, arts and crafts to attract the support of scholars and doctors and even the emperor and other ruling class figures, find common ground between Catholic doctrine and Confucianism, join Confucianism, complement Confucianism, and preach in a way suitable for Chinese customs. This method of missionary work is the "adaptation strategy" of "going into the countryside and following the customs", and its core is to respect And adapt to Chinese culture, which is also due to the role played by China's national strength at that time, and the great powers of the world cannot underestimate this Eastern Empire.
However, after Matteo Ricci's death, controversy arose within the Society of Jesus. The point of contention is whether the Confucian classics of "heaven", "God", and "God" have the same meaning as the Latin deus. Are worshippers, ancestors, and kongs idolatrous and superstitious? This is the dispute over Chinese etiquette, and it is also the dispute over cultural discourse.
It is said that Kangxi (1654-1722) was once ill, cold and feverish, and after the imperial medicine was medicated, the effect was not good, and the fever still did not go away. Two Western missionaries who were teachers at Kangxi's side told Kangxi that the disease was nothing remarkable, but malaria, and that taking cinchona cream (later purified to make the antimalarial Western medicine quinine) would be cured. They say that in France this method has been tried and tested. Kangxi learned that this was a white powder extracted from the bark of a tree called cinchona, and the taste was bitter, so it was called cinchona cream, which was the nemesis of malaria. It was found that the two missionaries in Guangdong had just received a whole pound of cinchona cream sent from France. Kangxi immediately issued a decree, and Hong Ruohan and two other priests immediately brought medicine into the Beijing Division.
For safety reasons, The Kangxi Dynasty decreed that four courtiers and malaria patients entering the palace should be given cinchona cream. One by one, the patients who were dying were out of danger the next day after taking the medicine, and the four courtiers were safe and sound, and slept very sweetly. Kangxi no longer ignored the objections of the imperial doctor, immediately ordered the cinchona cream to be brought, and drank it without hesitation. The high fever finally receded. Kangxi decreed that western missionaries would be allowed to preach in Beijing from now on, and he personally selected a large house to give to the missionaries to live in, and exiled the imperial healing sin of healing. The Jesuit missionaries sent by King Louis XIV of France to China finally used the stepping stones of Western medicine to open a gap in the walls of the Forbidden City to spread the gospel of Christ. This story gradually spread in Beijing, and the status of Chinese medicine was seriously challenged.
What Kangxi did not expect was that the Control of the Western Church over the Chinese Catholics made him uneasy.
In the thirty-second year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1693), Yan Dang, a French foreign missionary who served as the acting pastor of Fujian, suddenly issued a decree prohibiting Chinese believers in his jurisdiction from worshipping their ancestors. As a result, the controversy over etiquette reached a climax, causing a fierce debate in China and Europe.
In November 1704, Pope Clement XI made a decision to ban Chinese etiquette and sent Doro on an envoy to China to settle the liturgical dispute. The Kangxi Emperor patiently explained Chinese etiquette to Doro, explaining that ancestor worship, confucius worship, and worship of heaven were by no means superstitious. He clearly pointed out: "The Chinese salute is not to pray for blessings from the card, but to pay homage to it." This is one of the key codes in China, and the stakes are enormous. He also emphasized: "Although the words of Catholics in reverence for God are different from those of China, they have the same meaning. However, Doro stubbornly insisted on banning Chinese etiquette. Therefore, the Kangxi Emperor decreed that all missionaries in China must receive a letter from the Qing court, declaring that they would never return to the West, abide by Matteo Ricci's rules, and obey Chinese etiquette before they could stay in China. Otherwise, they are never allowed to live in China and will be expelled. However, the Holy See was obstinate, and in January 1721, missionaries translated the papal ban into Chinese and presented it to the Imperial Household. After reading it, the Kangxi Emperor angrily instructed: "Reading this notice, you can only talk about how Westerners and other villains can speak of China's dali." ...... In the future, there is no need for Westerners to practice religion in China, and it is forbidden to do so, so as not to be troublesome. ”
In the year after Yongzheng ascended the throne (1624), he issued a nationwide ban on Catholicism, and did not recognize the "sealed tickets" issued by Kangxi to missionaries. During Qianlong's reign, missionary activities were still prohibited, and this situation continued until the Opium War. According to 1810 statistics, there were still 31 European missionaries operating secretly in 16 provinces of Chinese mainland, with a total of 205,000 Catholics. By June 1839, Catholicism was reported to be active in 13 provinces of China, with 65 European missionaries and 300,000 Catholics.
To a certain extent, this shows that the introduction of Western medicine has become a fact, and the impact on Wang Qingren is by no means impossible.
Wang Qingren inspected the corpse for non-autopsy
Wang Qingren said in "Correcting Mistakes in the Medical Forest": "The predecessors created medical books, and the internal organs were wrong; the later generations followed the theory, the sick book was lost first, the sick book was lost, even if there was the pen of the embroidered tiger carving dragon, the ability to cut the clouds and supplement the moon, the disease and the internal organs, absolutely incompatible, this medical path has no origin of the whole person." Husbands and wives diagnose diseases, and when they first understand the internal organs. Taste the ancient people's internal organs and the drawings drawn, and the statements are contradictory everywhere. Therefore, he paid special attention to observation, hoping to correct the errors recorded in ancient medical books. However, instead of cutting and dissecting with a knife like Western scholars, they went to the mass grave and observed the dead bodies. It is very difficult to see a person's internal organs clearly, so Wang Qingren spent 40 years to gradually understand the situation of the diaphragm.
Anatomy is an important reason for the progress of Western medicine, but it is not the method of developing Chinese medicine. There is no doubt that the theory of organs in Chinese medicine is based on anatomy, if ancient Chinese medicine did not have a basic understanding of organ anatomy, it would be impossible to divide the organs and intestines, nor would it put forward the concept of "five organs" and "six organs", let alone speculate on the similarities and differences in the function of the organs, or generally speak out the specific functions of the organs. However, due to the limitations of technical means, the anatomy of Chinese medicine can only stay at the level visible to the naked eye, and it is impossible to develop to the level of tissues, cells and molecules. Then, how to coherent the complex functions between the internal organs, how to establish the relationship between man and nature, how the human body carries out metabolism, how the human body maintains health, how to overcome diseases, and so on, must be found on another basis. The constitutive theory of qi monism, the contradictory theory of yin and yang theory, the extensive connection of the five elements theory, the balanced constraint, and the spirit of steady-state harmony all give strong theoretical support to the primitive Chinese medicine that is looking for theoretical explanations. That is to say, the development of Traditional Chinese medicine after its establishment is mainly based on the "relation theory" of extensive connections, rather than the "entity theory" of organ dissection.
"Medical Forest Correction" has a great impact and many controversies
Wang Qingren's "Medical Forest Correction"
The theory of the internal organs of Chinese medicine has been circulated for 2000 years, and no one has come out to "correct errors" before the medical scientists, and even like Zhang Jingyue, a famous doctor at the end of the Ming Dynasty, praising the "Inner Classic" as "character zhujie", it is not insensitive, or foolish, and has never seen the truth, but there is no direct connection between the fine anatomical knowledge and the use of dialectical treatment of Traditional Chinese medicine. Western medicine, on the other hand, is mainly surgery, and it is impossible to carry out surgery without dissection. The emphasis on and contempt for anatomy is entirely out of practical necessity, not at all because of the problem of unscientific science.
The blood-activating prescriptions invented by Wang Qingren are all rooted in the qi and blood theory of traditional Chinese medicine, and do not require anatomical knowledge at all. That is to say, the discovery of no anatomical knowledge will not affect the establishment of the theory of active blood stasis. Because, there is no qi seen in the dead body, and it is impossible to push out the qi to be able to perform blood, no matter how to say that "replenishing the yang and returning the five soups", it is also a flower in the theoretical system of Chinese medicine, and it cannot be pressed on the head of anatomy.
Despite this, people at the time could not see things that way. Therefore, Wang Qingren's corrective action shocked the hearts of Chinese medicine people, and his excellent prescription efficacy increased the influence of his seemingly innovative theory, and the Chinese medicine community lost confidence and almost collapsed: the organs are unknown, and the dirty elephants are reliable?
Of course, Wang Qingren's book "Medical Forest Correction" also has its origin relationship in academics.
According to the "Modern History of Traditional Chinese Medicine" edited by Professor Deng Tietao, although the history of the introduction of Western medicine to China is not very long, it can also be divided into two periods, one is the early introduction of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, and the other is the "second period of introduction of Western medicine" after the introduction of cowpox to China in 1805.
After Matteo Ricci (1552--1610) came to China in 1582, preached in China for 30 years, went to the palace for forbidden, and received Han Shi, although it was not specifically introduced to Western medicine, it had already spread the new doctrine of "the room of memory in the brain" to China, which caused people to shake.
The Swiss missionary Deng Yuhan (1576--1630) translated the Introduction to the Theory of the Taixi People in China, which was published in 1635 and was the first anatomical work introduced to China.
The translation of the "Illustration of the Human Body" by Roya Gu (1593--1638) also has a copy of it. However, although these two anatomical works reflect the anatomical level of the Galen era, they are already much more elaborate and realistic than the "freehand" description of the "True Picture of the Human Body" in the ancient Chinese medicine book.
In 1612, Xiong Sanba's "Taixi Water Law" introduced the production method of Western medicine dew, which also attracted the attention of the Chinese people.
Chen Dingtai, a physician at The New Society in Guangdong, visited Guangzhou because of his mother's illness and met the doctor Wang Zhaofu, who told about Wang Qingren's "Correction of Mistakes in the Medical Forest", which aroused Chen Dingtai's great interest. Chen Dingtai believes that Wang Qingren "has been tested for its authenticity in the internal organs, but it has not yet been accurate in the meridians." Therefore, with the help of his friend Hu Qinchuan, he met a person who had witnessed the autopsy of Western medicine, this person was named Liang Lingshan. Under the introduction of Liang, he saw the anatomical works of Western medicine, the anatomical drawings of Western realist painters, and the exquisite and meticulous pictures caused Chen Dingtai to shake. Therefore, in 1844, 14 years after the publication of "Medical Forest Correction", he wrote "Medical Talk Fax", which combined Wang Qingren's works with the content of Western anatomy and absorbed 16 anatomical pictures of Western medicine (2). Chen did not understand English, and did not have Chinese anatomy works to refer to, so he only borrowed the original English anatomy of the "reading and literacy" style, which was inevitably incorrect. Chen also witnessed craniotomy, cataract surgery, enema surgery, etc. in Western medicine, and became an early Huitong physician. Chen Dingtai's descendant Chen Zhenge passed on his learning and wrote "The General Center of Medical Programs" and so on.
The Chinese translation of Hexin's "New Treatise on the Whole" was officially published in 1850, and since then China has had the first true western medical anatomy work.
Luo Dingchang, Sichuan, in 1886, referring to Wang Qingren's "Correction of Mistakes in the Medical Forest" and Hexin's "New Theory of the Whole", wrote "The Complete Map of the Organs of Chinese and Western Physicians" the following year, and in 1893, he co-edited this book with his previous "Diagram of the Mechanism of Yixiang Yin yang organ disease", entitled "The Essence of Chinese and Western Medicine", published by Qianqingtang Bookstore.
Guangdong Nanyang Zhu Peiwen, in 1893 published "Huayang Dirty Elephant Approximation", he and Chen Dingtai, although he saw the anatomical works of Western medicine and knew the "true organs", but for the ancient Tradition of Chinese medicine organs, can he completely give up? Therefore, "they can be connected and coexist and different", emphasizing that they cannot be combined, but must be combined.
Tang Zonghai (1846--1897), pengxian county, Sichuan, was a representative figure of Huitong traditional Chinese and Western medicine. In 1892, he wrote "Five Kinds of Chinese and Western Medicine Books". Tang Zonghai tried to integrate the theories of Chinese and Western medicine into each other, he believes: "Western medicine only knows chromatography, but does not know the meridians; only knows the traces, but does not know the gasification." There are advantages and disadvantages with Chinese medicine. "It is thought that although the theoretical system and reasoning method of the two are different, the fundamental principle is the same. He pointed out that if Chinese medicine is to be improved, it should learn from the strengths of Western medicine. He advocates that "profit and loss are ancient and modern", "refers to China and foreign countries", and advocates that "there are no differences and differences in territory, but the compromise is one", so that medicine can be "good and unprepared, beautiful and perfect". As a result, he is revered as an enlightened Huitong physician.
He believes that "nei", "difficult" and the book of Zhongjing are extremely accurate", and "since the Song and Yuan dynasties, there have been many miaos", so when annotating or correcting the classic works of Chinese medicine such as the "Neijing", "On Typhoid Fever", and "The Outline of jin kui", most of them use the anatomical and physiological knowledge of Western medicine to confirm the correctness of Chinese medicine theory, and unconsciously adopt the evaluation standards of Western medicine.
He believes that the meridians in Chinese medicine are consistent with what Western medicine calls "tubes"; what Western medicine calls pancreatic juice, gastric juice, bile, etc., is called "jin liquid" in Chinese medicine; Sanjiao is the large omentum in the abdominal cavity of the human body, which is the channel of qi, blood and water. It can be seen that his criteria for convergence are dissection and empirical evidence. In terms of drugs, he discussed the theories of the smell, attribution and compatibility of Chinese medicine, explained the function of Chinese medicine with the smell of Chinese medicine and the experimental theory of Western medicine, and pointed out that the sexual taste function of Chinese medicine was summarized in long-term practice, and there was no fundamental difference with the experimental research of Western medicine.
These views are all based on the comparison of Traditional Chinese and Western medicine, under the historical conditions at that time, it can only be superficial and superficial at the level of organs, and it is difficult to achieve the realm of "integration and penetration". The method he adopted was an evaluation system based on anatomy, which was basically consistent with Wang Qingren's "Correction of Mistakes in Medical Forest", but the tone of criticism was eased.
Although such Huitong physicians are emotionally biased towards Chinese medicine, and epistemology, it depends on the anatomy of Western medicine, which also determines that in the future in the debate between Chinese and Western medicine, Chinese medicine will inevitably be in an extremely disadvantageous position, and when talking about medical theory, it will even be unable to answer and become a Chinese medicine doctor with aphasia. It is inevitable that Chinese medicine will go to paradise.
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