Chapter 18 Section 7 Li Shizhen, a medical scientist

Li Shizhen (1518-1593 AD), styled Dongbi.A native of Qizhou (now Qichun, Hubei) in the Ming Dynasty.He lived in Waniba (now Qizhou Town) at the junction of the two lakes and Lianshi Lake, so he was named Binhushanren in his later years.He was born in a family of Confucianism and medicine handed down from generation to generation. His grandfather was a good doctor, and his father Li Yanwen, later named Yuechi.Bocha classics and history, because of his medical name, was appointed by the imperial court as an official of the imperial hospital. There are several works, but none of them have been handed down.

Li Shizhen was addicted to classics when he was young. At the age of 14, he passed the examination of scholar, but failed three times in the provincial examination (examination of Juren).At that time, seeing that his father's superb medical skills relieved many people's sufferings, especially his own "bone steam" (tuberculosis), which almost killed him, and was cured after his father's careful treatment, so at the age of 24, he decided to abandon the imperial examination career and inherit the family education.He went to see a doctor with his father during the day, and studied medical books under the lamp at night. His diligent study and practice made his medical skills greatly improved and his reputation rose.

He read a lot of medical books and found that the previous generation of herbal books were unsatisfactory, so he had the ambition to rebuild herbal medicine.Regarding the cursive script, since then, there have been several large-scale revisions of the herbal script, and the imperial court presided over the compilation three times, namely the "Xinxiu Materia Medica" completed in the fourth year of Tang Xianqing (AD 659), and the sixth year of Song Kaibao (AD 973). The completed "Kaibao Materia Medica", and the "Jiayou Materia Medica" completed in the fifth year of Song Jiayou (AD 1060).The "Zheng Lei Materia Medica" compiled by Tang Shenwei in the Song Dynasty contained 1746 kinds of medicines, and was regarded as the most complete herbal book at that time.However, after Li Shizhen's investigation, it was found that there were many mistakes, some of which were not classified accurately; some two medicines were recorded as one substance; Mistakes abound, and there are plenty of missed medicines.So he personally went to many drug-producing areas to investigate and inquire, and traveled all over Hubei, Jiangxi, Anhui, Jiangsu, Henan, Hebei and other places, humbly asking for advice from farmers, hunters, fishermen, woodcutters, drug farmers, and bell doctors.And collect specimens, trace drawings, and sometimes try some medicines in person.For example, Tao Hongjing believed that taking ginger for a long time would cause "sadness"; Su Gong believed that Tao's theory was groundless, and ginger could be taken regularly; Sun Simiao believed that taking ginger regularly would cause eye diseases.In order to verify which opinion is correct, Li Shizhen often ate ginger. As expected, she suffered from eye disease, and then ate it after recovery. After a long time, she suffered from eye disease again.After repeated experiments several times, the correct conclusion was reached: "Eating ginger for a long time will cause eye problems due to accumulated heat." Li Shizhen spent 30 years referring to more than 800 books, and after three revisions, finally compiled a book on herbal medicine of unprecedented scale. named.But at that time, it was not taken seriously by the imperial court, and the publishing work suffered many setbacks. It was not published until three years after Li Shizhen's death.

A total of 52 volumes, more than 1.9 million words.The book is divided into 16 classes and 62 orders, containing 1892 kinds of medicines, 11096 prescriptions and 1109 illustrations.It goes without saying that this work has made great achievements in medicine, and has made outstanding contributions in chemistry, geology, astronomy, and biology.After it was first published, it was introduced to Japan only 10 years later, and was later translated into Japanese, Korean, French, German, English, Russian, Latin and other languages.Darwin, the founder of the British theory of evolution, praised the book as "the encyclopedia of ancient China". "Summary of Siku Quanshu" states: "(The book) all medical practitioners have their own compilation, and "History of Ming Dynasty Fangji Zhuan" is very famous. There is no one who has collected the great achievements of Materia Medica!"

Li Shizhen was very serious in diagnosing and treating diseases, and the treatment effect was outstanding.He used Yanhusuo to cure Jingmu Princess Hu's stomachache.The grandson of King Fushun was addicted to eating lantern flowers. The doctors didn't know what the disease was and were at a loss what to do.At that time, King Fushun was at odds with his son. Once his son was ill, he asked Li Shizhen for diagnosis and treatment. After the prescription, King Fushun asked where he had entered. Shizhen answered "Fuzi Heqi (homophony of father and son harmony) soup", and he felt King Fushun, so the father and son were in harmony as before. .Therefore, the king of Chu believed that Li Shizhen had excellent medical skills and moral character, so he recruited him to serve as a shrine to the king's mansion and to work as a good doctor.After taking office, Li Shizhen still often went out to see a doctor for the common people, and was deeply loved by the common people.A few years later, he was recommended by the king of Chu and entered Beijing as the judge (deputy director) of Taiyuan Hospital.However, Li Shizhen was very disappointed because the emperor at that time believed in the "elixir" of immortality and trusted the people who contributed to the flames.Therefore, after only one year of service, he resigned and returned to his hometown on the pretext of illness.But this year he was able to read a large number of medical books, and the research on materials and actual herbal medicine played a great role in motivating him to establish his determination to rebuild herbal medicine.

Li Shizhen's works also include a variety of collections of poetry and essays, but only medical works have been handed down to the world, except for "Binhu Maijue", "Qijing Bamai Kao", etc., all of which have a certain influence.