The Ultimate Discourse on Alchemy 丹经极论

The author is unknown. Judging from the content, it was presumably composed during the Song Dynasty. Consisting of one scroll, it is included in the Methods Category of the The Dongzhen Section within the The Daozang.

This work is divided into three sections: Fire Timing for External Medicine, Movement of Internal Medicine, and Spirit Projection, discussing the internal alchemical practices of the Southern School of the Golden Elixir Sect. Its method takes the innate primal Qi as the foundation of the Golden Elixir and the dual cultivation of nature (xing) and life (ming) as the key to refining the elixir. It holds that nature is Yin within Yang, and life is Yang within Yin; nature is function, and life is substance. Nature and life, Yin and Yang, are interdependent—only when substance and function are complete can one attain the wonderful Dao.

The Ultimate Discourse on Alchemy

It further classifies medicinal substances into two types: external medicine refers to the Golden Elixir, and internal medicine refers to the Golden Fluid Return Elixir. Although their creation is the same, the fire timing in practice differs. Using the innate Yang Elixir to transform one’s own Yin Mercury into pure Yang, and then regulating the advance, retreat, increase, and decrease with the talismanic fire of Yin and Yang, after ten months of successful practice, form transforms, Qi transforms into spirit, and spirit unites with the Dao. Thus, the Golden Elixir is refined, enabling unpredictable transformations.

Appended at the end of the scroll are four ci-poems from Surviving Chapters of Awakening to Truth and five ci-poems from Surviving Chapters of Returning the Elixir and Restoring Life, which discuss nature cultivation (xing gong) by borrowing Chan Buddhism terms.