I. Various terms for the Elements:
The modern work Chang-huang t`u-shu pien[1965]
states that in the Yiking
the Five Elements are named [OMITTED] Wu-wei, Five Positions,[1966]
in historical
works [OMITTED] Wu-tsai, Five Materials, in chronicles or essays [OMITTED] Wu-wu,
Five Things, and in medical works [OMITTED] Wu-yün, Five Revolutions.
Mayers (Manual p. 313) gives some more terms: [OMITTED] Wu-chieh, Five
Sections, [OMITTED] Wu-mei, Five Excellencies, and
[OMITTED] Wu-ch`i, Five
Fluids. They are descriptive of the elements under various aspects, as
substances formed of matter, as fluids or vapours, as moving and revolving,
or as keeping certain positions. But by far the commonest expression is
[OMITTED] Wu-hsing, on the meaning of which the Chinese and foreign authorities
are agreed.
[OMITTED] hsing is "
to act" and "
to move," the
Wu-hsing
are, therefore, the five essences which are always active and in motion.
Mayers (loc. cit.) calls them the primordial essences or perpetually active
principles of nature. The term is all but equivalent to
[OMITTED] Wu-yün,
the
Five Revolutions.
