Leftover Pearls from the Dharma Sea 法海遗珠

The compiler is unknown, and the book was roughly compiled in the late Yuan and early Ming dynasties. Consisting of forty-six volumes, it is included in the Taiping Section of The Daozang.

Leftover Pearls from the Dharma Sea

This book compiles the magical arts of various Taoist sects in the Song and Yuan dynasties, including the Southern School of the Golden Elixir Sect, Zhengyi Dao (the Celestial Master Sect), the Pure Brightness Sect and the Xihe Sect, collecting more than forty treatises on secret talisman and incantation methods. The Taoist arts recorded here center on Thunder Magic, which is applied to summon gods and command ghosts, call the wind and raise the rain, conjure clouds and invoke thunder, urge snow and control lightning, stop rain and pray for sunshine, avert evil stars, extinguish fire disasters, perform salvation rituals for the deceased, cure illnesses and eliminate consumptive diseases, slay ghosts and capture evil spirits—with detailed and complete practice rituals and formulas for each of these purposes.

A defining feature of the Thunder Magic described in the book is the combined use of internal alchemy and external talismans, integrating the inner alchemical practices of silent cultivation and visualization with the external Taoist arts of summoning Thunder Gods through talismans, scriptures and incantations. Whenever one inscribes talismans and recites incantations to call upon celestial beings from beyond, one must first engage in silent contemplation and inner cultivation, refining the spirit and unifying it with Qi within the body. Only then does one exhale this internally refined energy onto the ritual altar, merging one’s own spirit with that of the Taoist masters to summon the Thunder Gods.

This method clearly draws on the magical arts of Esoteric Buddhism; even the incantations used herein, such as "Om Nie Lin Om Du Lin", are adopted from Esoteric Buddhist mantras. The origins and schools of Thunder Magic in the Song and Yuan dynasties elaborated in the book also provide valuable references for researchers of Taoist studies.