Cúncuì yīhuà 存粹醫話

Medical Conversations from the Preservation-of-Essence [Studio] by 陸錦燧 Lù Jǐnsuì ( Jìnshēng 晉笙, fl. 1900s–1920s), early Republican-era Sūzhōu literatus-physician.

About the work

A four- clinical-theoretical miscellany by Lù Jǐnsuì — the early Republican Sūzhōu physician already represented in the corpus by KR3ed149 Pūxī mìchuán jiǎnyàn fāng 䱐溪秘傳簡驗方 — covering classical-medical theory, drug commentary, clinical aphorisms, and case-records. The work opens directly with a discussion of the Nèijīngbiāo / běn / zhōngqì cónghuà” 標本中氣從化 doctrine — the canonical Sùwèn doctrine of the relations between the surface (biāo), root (běn), and intermediate- aspects of the six channels — citing the late-Míng Kòu Mèngjié 寇孟傑 commentary on this question; then proceeds through “Xūhuǒ shíhuǒ yīnhuǒ shuō” 虛火實火陰火說 (the xū / shí / yīn trichotomy of febrile pathology), drug commentary, and clinical entries.

Prefaces

No separate front-matter preface in the jicheng.tw exemplar (the work was printed by subscription in the early Republican period and the prefaces are dispersed across the four ). Internal cross-reference in KR3eq069 confirms the work’s Beijing initial printing prior to its Sūzhōu / Sānsānshè 三三社 reissue.

Abstract

Lù Jǐnsuì 陸錦燧 (Jìnshēng) is a leading early-Republican Sūzhōu physician-scholar in the literatus-physician tradition that includes KR3eq049 (Wáng Tàilín / Mènghé) and the broader Wēnbìng tradition of the late Qīng. The Cúncuì yīhuà is the principal doctrinal-aphoristic companion to Lù’s clinical-formulary work in KR3ed149 Pūxī mìchuán jiǎnyàn fāng and to his case-record work in KR3eq068 Jǐngjǐng yīhuà and KR3eq069 Jǐngjǐngshì yīgǎo zácún. The composition window 1910–1925 reflects Lù’s documented productive period. The work is preserved digitally at jicheng.tw.

Historiographical significance: the Cúncuì yīhuà and the related Lù-corpus texts are useful sources for the early-Republican literatus-physician’s engagement with traditional Chinese medical doctrine in the period of intensifying Western-medical competition. Lù’s doctrinal position is integrative — defending classical Chinese medicine without rejecting Western anatomical-pathological frameworks. Not in CBDB.

Translations and research

No substantial European-language translation of Cún-cuì yī-huà located. For the broader early-Republican Chinese medical context see Bridie Andrews, The Making of Modern Chinese Medicine 1850–1960 (UBC, 2014); Sean Hsiang-lin Lei, Neither Donkey Nor Horse (Chicago, 2014).