Yínán Jízhèng Jiǎnfāng 疑難急症簡方
Concise Formulas for Difficult and Emergency Cases by 羅越峰 (Luó Yuèfēng, fl. late Qīng), with preface dated 1895 by 胡震 (Hú Zhèn) of Yáoběi 姚北
About the work
A late-Qīng clinical formulary specialising in 疑難 yínán (difficult-to-diagnose / chronic-puzzling) and 急症 jízhèng (emergency) cases — the two ends of the clinical spectrum that conventional formularies handle least well: the chronic-and-puzzling cases that have defeated several rounds of treatment, and the emergencies that require immediate intervention without time for elaborate pulse-and-syndrome analysis. The work assembles tested-and-effective formulas for both categories, with strong emphasis on the jiǎn (concise) — single-formula or few-ingredient prescriptions that can be remembered and applied directly.
Prefaces
Preface by Hú Zhèn 胡震, of YáoběiYíngqiáo 姚北瀛嶠 (modern Yúyáo 余姚 county, Zhèjiāng), early summer 1895 (Guāngxù 21 chūxià).
“The top-grade medicines are three: shén, qì, jīng (spirit, qì, essence). Modern people, not knowing how to protect what is genuine, recklessly dissipate their zhēnqì (true qì); on this account, all manner of diseases swarm and rise. The Nèijīng says: ‘Whoever does not store essence in winter must fall sick of warm-disease in spring’ — and from this the diseases of the four seasons can be inferred. — In matters of life and death, the quán (deciding-power) rests with the Sīmìng (Director of Destinies); but if one can pull life back from death, is that not equal-to-but-without-the-tablet of a worthy minister?
“In late spring of yǐwèi [= 1895] I visited a friend at Shào[-xīng] and there encountered Mr. Luó Yuèfēng. We talked for many days. I learned that the gentleman is bǐngxìng chúncuì (pure-of-nature and refined), pǐnxíng duānfāng (upright-in-deportment), profession-rooted in QíHuáng, his upper-arm proverbially broken-thrice [the proverb that one becomes a good physician through personal experience of illness], collecting good formulas progressively, behind ten years of windowed study having only just brought one juǎn to completion; he has contributed his own funds to cut the woodblocks, so that fellow-practitioners may benefit. The reader sees them at a glance — the price is low and the merit large, the simplest of the simple, the easiest of the easy — better than the difficult-to-find prescriptions of the hidden libraries.
“Yuèfēng is the younger brother of my father-in-law’s [外舅] Mr. Yànxiāng. My father-in-law served in office in Zhuō [-zhōu], in the prefectural staff, year-after-year — there was no day on which he did not put the people’s hardships at heart, and consider how to give them treatment; he was indeed medicine through government. The gentleman though did not enter office, his heart of saving the people is single-minded; his family holds many books, especially medical books, of which half are the inheritance of his grandfather Jìngxuāngōng 敬軒公…”
Abstract
A precisely-dated early-summer 1895 clinical formulary by Luó Yuèfēng, of Shàoxīng 紹興, Zhèjiāng. The work is the product of ten years of careful collection by a non-officeholding gentleman-physician of substantial means and educational background, drawing on his own grandfather Jìngxuāngōng 羅敬軒’s accumulated medical library. The compiler’s older brother Yànxiānggōng 羅硯香公 held official rank as a zhōumù (district-administrator’s secretary) at Zhuōzhōu 涿州 (Héběi) and was father-in-law of the preface-writer Hú Zhèn.
The work is therefore evidence of a Shào-xīng-prefecture late-Qīng medical-clan: the Luó family of Yuèfēng / Yànxiāng / Jìngxuān, three generations active in officialdom and medicine, with continuous library accumulation. The compiler funded his own woodblock-cutting (juānzī kānbǎn) for charitable distribution — making the work a representative of the late-Qīng literati-charity-publishing tradition.
The book’s specific clinical focus on the yínán + jízhèng combination is distinctive: it targets precisely the cases where popular pharmacology was most-likely to fail and where the marginal value of a well-tested simple formula was highest. This distinguishes the work from the encyclopedic Qīng popular formularies and aligns it with the jīngyàn fāng (tested-formulas) curated-selection genre.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located. The work circulated in the 1895 Shàoxīng woodblock-printing and a few late-Qīng / Republican-era reprints.
Links
- See 羅越峰 and 胡震.
- 疑難急症簡方 (jicheng.tw)
- Kanseki DB