Tools for the Three Ultimates 三极至命筌蹄

Composed by Wang Qingsheng during the Song Dynasty.

Consisting of one scroll, it is included in the Miscellaneous Arts Category of the The Dongzhen Section within the Taoist Canon (The Daozang).

Tools for the Three Ultimates

As a miscellaneous work on Internal Alchemy (Neidan), its content is divided into three parts: diagram explanations, treatises, and eulogistic mnemonics. It opens with seventeen diagrams, including Odd and Even Numbers, Wuji (Ultimate Void), Taiji (Supreme Ultimate), Liangyi (Two Principles), Sixiang (Four Symbols), Bagua (Eight Trigrams), Huangji (Imperial Ultimate), Hunyuan Sanbao (Primal Mixed Three Treasures), Jiugong Yongzhong (Nine Palaces Upholding the Middle), and Shigan Naja (Ten Heavenly Stems Incorporating Jia). Each diagram is accompanied by a seven-character regulated poem as annotation, generally borrowing trigram symbols and Yijing (I Ching) principles to elaborate on the Dao of nature (xing) and life (ming) in Internal Alchemy.

Next are treatises such as Five Chariots and Three Vehicles, General Account of the Three Essentials, General Account of the Three Passes, and General Account of the Nine Cauldrons, which interpret Internal Alchemy terms including the Three Vehicles, Five Chariots, Three Essentials, Three Passes, and Nine Cauldrons.

Finally, there are eulogistic mnemonics, including more than ten works such as Eulogy on Chunyang Zhenren’s Shuangtian Xiaojiao (Dawn Bugle in Frosty Sky), Yinfu Pomai Zan (Eulogy on Breaking Delusions with the Yin Fu Jing), Guxian Zhenjue Jiju (Collected Sentences of True Mnemonics from Ancient Immortals), Xiuzhen Liuyong (Six Uses in Cultivating Perfection), Wukong Song (Song of Five Emptinesses), and Xiudan Shijie (Ten Precepts for Refining the Elixir).

The author claims to have obtained his alchemical mnemonics from Taoyuanzi, a disciple of Bai Yuchan, yet the alchemical method described actually forms a school of its own.