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Liuzhuang Xiangfa · Liuzhuang's Methods of Physiognomy
Yongle Questions and Answers
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91. Lying Down and Judgments of Wealth, Rank and Poverty
Lying down brings the ease of sleep and must be settled. Coiling like a dragon or curling like a dog is called a noble configuration. Sleeping with the hands around the head is linked with understanding lawsuits. Long-outstretched legs and arms are called a laid-out corpse and judged highly unfavorable. Long dreams with talking to oneself are attributed to a frenzied, deceitful person. The quoted book says that much wild speech in dreams goes with much wild speech before others.
Sleeping with the back facing Heaven is linked with starvation. Moving the feet in sleep is called an upper-class configuration. The isolated “rising in sleep” phrase is linked with early death; sleeping without closed eyes with an ill death. Another saying links wild dream speech with deceit and deceiving others, and open eyes and an open mouth with punishment.
Note: “Rising in sleep” follows the supplied wording; a different sleeping action is not invented.
92. Eating and Judgments of Wealth, Rank and Poverty
Eating sustains the whole body. The opening nevertheless says there should be no physiognomic method for it. While eating, the mouth should open large and close small; food taken in promptly is called excellent. Monkey eating and rat dining are dismissed. Frequent choking while eating is linked with exile as a convict. Smacking the lips like a pig is said to bring violent death; a neck moving like a horse's lifelong toil.
Note: The opening's denial of a method and the rules that immediately follow are both retained.
93. Speech and Judgments of Wealth, Rank and Poverty
Speech differs from voice. Voice issues from the dantian, speech from lips and mouth. Hence they are not of the same category. A person's speech, lips and tongue should be balanced and unhurried, without showing teeth. Hurried, scorched, confused or overflowing speech is called lowly and linked with lifelong lack of accomplishment.
Verse:
Speech should be balanced and qi harmonious;
The noble speak little, the petty much.
With overflowing talk and restless lips,
Poverty, low standing, illness and troubles are said to remain close.
94. Laughter and Judgments of Wealth, Rank and Poverty
Laughter issues from joy and should not depart from ordinary behavior. A cold laugh is linked with many plans and ample intelligence; concealed feelings with lifelong treachery and poverty. Laughter should open the mouth widely and sound out, not remain closed and silent. A horse-like neigh is not called beautiful.
Verse:
An open mouth and long-sounding laugh are called worthy;
The voice within the throat distinguishes worthiness from treachery.
Horse neighing and ape cries instead
Are linked with poverty, hardship and no money.
95. Account of the Five Phases
Metal, Wood, Water, Fire and Earth: the bodily form does not go beyond the Five Phases.
A Metal form has a square face, straight ears, clear brows, elegant eyes, matching lips and teeth, small hands, a round waist and white color. A high voice like Metal is linked with great rank; a mixed pattern lesser rank. Obstruction and red are disapproved of. Obstruction is Earth burying Metal and means hardship. Red at the nose tip and Three Yang means disaster: ruin if light, death if severe. A Metal person should not carry Fire. The quoted verse calls for complete regions and square Three Divisions, making a Metal pattern that spreads fame through wealth and rank.
A Wood form should be a straight, elegant, long trunk, with clear pupils, moist mouth and abundant spirit; not slanted, pared, crooked, withered or sunken. A round waist and upright body are said to make a supporting beam. Slanting and paring are called petty signs; exposed sinews and bones are dismissed without further inquiry. A damaged clause about achievement says a little must accompany it, while a larger amount becomes Water and Fire mutually bright. Red Earth and red Metal are rejected. A little Metal may still accompany a seeker of fame, but pared Wood with heavy Metal means a life of success and failure. The quoted lines describe an angular, thin, imposing, long form concealing refined qi in brows and eyes, and call it a beam and pillar.
A Water form should have upright bones, solid flesh, white color, moistness and a developed body. The following wording about returning facial patterns and an upturned appearance is unclear. A large abdomen and a large “hall” are then said to constitute Water form. Coarse qi and black color are disapproved of, while skin is described as white as powder and floating facial flesh rejected. Little bone and much floating flesh in a Water form mean early death; no beard and slippery skin mean no children, as does cold flesh. The quoted verse gives large eyes, coarse brows and a rounded “city wall,” calling this true Water with natural lifelong fortune.
A Fire form is pointed above and broad below, restless and dry in form, with little beard, red face and a delicate, tapering nose. Obstructed color is disapproved of; brightness and moistness favored. Red ears and little beard are mentioned, while large abdomen and large mouth are rejected. Its rank is said to reach only an established post and wealth only a hundred in gold, not great wealth and rank. Among its Three Divisions a high head is additionally required for children; otherwise children are difficult to obtain. The quoted fragment identifies Fire through pointedness, a clean bodily form and sparse side-whiskers.
An Earth form is large, thick and substantial, with a weighty face, solid bones, raised skin and dark color, a voice like thunder, short neck and round head. This is called true Earth. The quoted lines praise upright thickness, depth and weight, calm like Mount Tai, an inward capacity for planning and assessing, and trustworthiness among people.
General song:
Wood is thin, Metal square, Water chiefly full;
Earth is substantial, its back like a turtle.
Pointed above, moist below and bright is Fire;
Examine the five bodily forms carefully.
Wood's color is blue-green, Fire's red;
Earth yellow and Water black are their true appearances.
Only Metal should carry white:
The five kinds of color differ.
People receive essence through Water and qi through Fire; thus Kan and Li allow the body to form. Essence first joins flesh and spirit is then born; spirit is first born and form then completed. Completeness within and without does not go beyond the phases' generation and restraint. Wealth, rank, poverty and low standing are placed in the matching of decline and strength, flourishing and weakness. Hence the account of Metal, Wood, Water, Fire and Earth. There are also forms of flying birds and running beasts.
Metal need not reject squareness, Wood thinness, Fire pointedness, Earth weight or Water darkness. Resembling Metal and obtaining Metal means deep intelligence; Wood with Wood sufficient ability; Water with Water high literary attainment; Fire with Fire deep understanding; Earth with Earth ample wealth and stipend. Generative support is favored, stripping and paring rejected.
Five Phases rhapsody:
Great is their principle of generating living things; the myriad images take it as their source. Wood requires a little Fire: brightness opens in autumn and lofty steps are clear. Metal and Wood head the spring examination lists. How can Fire restraining Metal become useful? Metal restraining Wood does not achieve fame. Little Wood and much Metal require advancing qi; much Wood and little Metal bring lifelong glory. A Metal person in a Fire pattern must become useful; a Water person in an Earth pattern is called foolish and obstinate. Weak Wood with much Metal is assigned only a sojourn of three tens. Firm, elegant, solid Metal becomes a pillar.
The next broken clause joins a person of the same kind, Earth restraining Water, and a holder of landed estates. Water generating Wood means entering office to seek fame. Timber for beams still needs Water's moistening. The following compressed words concern the state's valuing Metal, Wood's glory and brightness, and obtaining Wood for usefulness. Wood moving into Metal means lifelong toil. Bodily principles follow generation and restraint; facial principles require mutual generation. Strength, decline, flourishing, superiority and weakness must match among the Five Phases before a true original form is accepted. The final broken wording calls for Wood color and encountering generative color for benefit, while restraining color means early death. Understand the phases' transformations: they produce countless variations. One indiscriminate judgment gravely misleads a whole life.
Middle Volume: Hundred Questions of Yongle.
Note: The supplied Water description alternates white and black, while the Earth prose gives dark color and the song yellow. Metal with Fire is both rejected and praised in different clauses. These differences are not harmonized. The Water passage's “hall,” the incomplete Wood qualification, the three-tens phrase and several rhapsody clauses remain uncertain as supplied; missing diagrams or explanatory words are not invented.
1. What Configuration Made Me King over the People?
Answer: Your Majesty is dragon-born and phoenix-grown, six chi tall, with a large face and round waist, able to take a three-chi stride. Hardship in youth came before the beard had reached its allotted growth. Now the beard is one chi and eight cun long, corresponding to the dragon configuration and the source's phrase “the lifespan of that year.”
Note: The closing lifespan phrase is incomplete as supplied. Measurements remain historical units, not modern conversions.
2. A Child Is Born and Its Father Receives Rank: Is This the Child's Fortune?
Answer: A child's birth filling the room with auspicious fragrance is said to mean great rank. The quoted book says a fragrant newborn body ensures the father's title and glorious reputation afterward. Liu Adou and Song Taizu are both said here to have had extraordinary bodily fragrance for a hundred days after birth.
Note: The biographical claims are the source's own reports.
4. Why Is There No Square-Faced Consort to Match My Square Face?
Answer: A woman's rank lies in eyes, shoulders and back; children in abdomen, breasts and navel. A square face is called a tiger face and said to encounter the Killing Star: how could it enter the palace as a noble consort? Only a phoenix form is called greatly noble. It has a round, long face, matching upper and lower regions and high brows, fine, elegant eyes, a round, long neck, and the source's brows-and-level-back wording. This is true rank: even outside the palace, such a woman is still promised the standing of a titled lady.
Note: The final cluster of brow and back descriptions is compressed as supplied.
5. If I No Longer Favor Lord Wang's Daughter, How Can She Become Mother of the Realm?
Answer: It is not that the future mother of the realm has little fortune. Your Majesty's Son Star has not yet appeared, hence she is not favored now. Once the later configuration forms, the queen's allotted life will extend. If a crown prince is to be born, it must be she who bears him. The source adds that after the third year of Yongle she indeed bore a crown prince.
Note: The timing and royal family relationship are retained as reported, not silently corrected against a historical genealogy.
6. Why Are Consort Candidates Made to Walk and Sweat in Heavy Padded Clothes?
Answer: The purpose is not to make the women sweat, but to learn their bodily fragrance. How else could one know a woman's bodily fragrance? The text says that this procedure yields great auspiciousness.
Note: The question's word after “thick” is damaged; no specific additional garment is invented.
9. Minister Wu's Mother Was Plain: Why Were Her Two Sons Like Zitong?
Answer: Though her face was plain, her eyes were like stars and lips like vermilion. Children are carried by navel and abdomen: what has that to do with facial beauty? She must have had a deep navel, thick abdomen, upright waist and firm body, inspiring awe in anyone who saw her. Women with imposing dignity are said often to bear noble sons. This is not fortune in the face but breadth, generosity and elegance in the five zang and six fu. The source says Yongle later titled her Lady of Jinyang. Another saying links elegant eyes and red lips with investiture for two states.
Verse:
A plain face, red lips and eyes like stars;
Her grave dignity astonishes the world.
Though she did not become a sovereign's queen,
Two states' honors are granted by the sage ruler.
An additional answer, without its question preserved, follows. Its damaged opening places killing qi above a military commander's eyes and brows, upright and high to view, and links this with fitness for warfare. Eyes without exposed radiance, a neck without red threads, and neither pig-like eating nor rat-like dining are called a good person's configuration, that of someone able to fight.
Note: The original title's comparison with Zitong is a named comparison, not a supplied description of the sons' offices. The attached military answer is retained without inventing a missing question.
10. Why Do Many Palace Women Have No Children?
The ancient saying gives a beautiful woman no shoulders and a general no neck. Excessively drooping shoulders, a body too weak, a waist too thin and a frame too light are the four conditions the text says occur most often. It denies them a configuration of abundant fortune and asks how they could obtain children.
12. Why Can Long Brows Accompany a Short Life?
The quoted book ranks long brow hairs below nose hairs, nose hairs below ear hairs, and ear hairs below a high pillow bone. It then says, “Thus long brows can assure longevity.” Lifespan is primarily assigned to scalp, neck skin and blood color.
Note: The affirmative claim about long brows is retained despite the question's apparent contrast; a missing negation is not inserted.
13. How Can Turned-Out Ears Accompany High Office?
Physiognomy distinguishes what must be avoided from what need not be. How could the whole face be inferred through an ear rule? The quoted book says yellow pupils with spiritual radiance, a broken bridge with a full nose tip, and a thin body without exposed bones are not counted as ruinous but are instead read as noble configurations.
14. How Are Shun's and Xiang's Double Pupils Distinguished?
Shun's eyes were fine and long: phoenix eyes. Xiang's were round and exposed, with skin lines rising at their edges like chicken eyes: an inauspicious configuration.
Note: The supplied question contains an irregular graph where the comparison is introduced; the answer names Xiang but does not supply a fuller personal name.
16. What Is Said of a Life Without Disease?
A person living in the world corresponds with Qian and Kun. High, bright Traveling Horses, quiet Borderlands, a level, upright Seal Hall, bright, moist Six Yang, and an Illness Palace without dark obstruction are said to mean fortune and longevity continuing throughout life.
17. What Is Said of a Life with Much Disease?
The Mountain Root always dark, the nose tip blue-green;
Dust upon both ears and dimness in the eyes;
Borderlands like mud and hair like grass:
The verse asks when such a life could find peace.
18. Why Have I Never Been Free of Worry Since Becoming Ruler?
Mountain Root and storehouses remain blue-green;
Nose tip red, cheeks yellow, qi uneven.
Even a ruler with these is said to worry;
An ordinary person accomplishes scarcely anything.
Only when these colors open, the answer says, will the sovereign's heart find peace.
19. Why Has My Reign Brought a Settled State, Prosperous People and Ample Land?
Sufficient blood, relaxed spirit and increasingly radiant eyes,
A level, moist Seal Hall: these are linked with flourishing glory.
A scholar or official obtains much fortune;
An ordinary person with them likewise enjoys peace and health.
20. Why Do Noble Houses Bear Lowly Women and Lowly Houses Noble Ones?
Women's physiognomy differs from men's; how could women lack a reading? A pointed head and little hair are assigned the daughter of a lowly family. A round form and upright eyes fit a good man's wife. Sufficient blood and harmonious qi are said to produce noble sons. An upright Earth region and level cheekbones preserve the family estate. Upright body and face, elegant eyes, red lips and rounded shoulders are promised great rank. By contrast, the daughter of a wealthy house with a level head, moist forehead, meteor-like eyes, thin lips, light body, beauty, pared storehouses, white teeth and shining flesh is nevertheless called a lowly woman.
21. What Are the Five Exposures and Five Reversals?
One or two exposures are said to leave no grain for a second night; three or four shorten life. All five together, however, are called a configuration of great rank. The eyes expose pupils but not radiance; the nose exposes openings without the source's unclear slanted/solid defect; the lips expose teeth but are not raised; the ears expose contours without losing their lobes. These are assigned Metal, Wood, Water, Fire and Earth. Exposed bridge, radiance, raised lips and lobes, by contrast, are called extremely lowly signs.
Five Reversals are not called favorable but attributed to fierce, harmful people. The quoted verse says their subtleties are many and asks how practitioners could know them. It then says that if not one feature is reversed, one should “hang purple you” at court.
Note: Though five exposures are claimed, only four bodily descriptions are explicitly supplied. The nose phrase is damaged, and the court phrase writes a word meaning friend after purple. Neither a fifth description nor a corrected court-garment word is invented.
22. Distinguishing Five Small Features from Five Extremes
The Five Small are: small head, small body, small hands, small feet and small face. These five concern the whole body, still judged primarily through the Five Offices and Six Storehouses. They are bodily smallness, not all five facial offices being small. If the offices are all small, they are called Five Extremes and assigned low standing.
The Five Small should have a large voice and matching Five Offices, Three Divisions and Six Storehouses. One unmatched part is unfavorable. The Five Extremes are here defined as forehead, ears, nose, eyes and mouth, the Five Stars of the phases. The quoted verse names body, head and four limbs for the Five Small, then ears, nose, mouth, eyes and brows, warning against all five offices being small and linking that with lifelong low standing and folly.
Note: The passage changes the named facial set between its prose and verse; the forehead is not silently replaced with brows in the prose.
23. Why Does Physiognomy Distinguish South and North?
This concerns the two capitals, north and south, and thirteen provinces. The text says ancient books lack it and calls it the master's own method. It speaks through the Twelve Palaces. The south belongs to Fire, so examine the Heavenly Court and favor flourishing Fire. The intervening wording is incomplete. The north belongs to Water, so examine the chin and favor flourishing Water. Zhejiang people belong to Metal and require clear Metal for personal glory. Fujian people are read through lips, mouth and teeth, because the region lies near the sea.
Taiyuan is called Shaanxi, the west, then the central region, belonging to Earth. Henan is read for steadiness, Huainan thickness and solidity, Huaibei expansive bearing, Jiangnan lightness and clarity. The source's “river water” does not reject heaviness and turbidity. Yuezhou is described as steep mountain terrain; an unclear jiang-face/yue-tail phrase then concerns qi and color rather than bone structure. Each locality must obtain its appropriate pattern before glory is promised.
Note: The geographical assignments, “river water” wording and final unclear phrase follow this source, not a corrected modern map or a substituted province name.
24. What Are the Three Points and Six Parings?
A pointed head, pointed face and the source's pointed tun item are called unfavorable. Six Storehouses all pared down are attributed to a person fond of killing. The author asks how these could obtain wealth and rank.
Note: The last of the Three Points is written with the pig graph here; it is not silently replaced with the graph for buttocks.
25. What Is Meant by Crane Form and Turtle Breathing?
A crane form rising into a step is said to leave the ground by three chi, with slanting shoulders, a long neck and the head preceding the step. In people now, the text reduces it to stepping high off the ground with the same long neck. It is assigned office up to ministerial rank and said to be capable of studying the immortals' ways.
Turtle breathing concerns settled sleep. Breath issuing through the mouth is denied both wealth and long life; through the nose it is assigned wealth, fortune and stipend. No breath through either mouth or nose, but breath issuing through the ears, is what this text calls turtle breathing. Easy sleeping and easy waking are called signs of great rank and an immortal's body, rare in the world. The author condemns careless talk about these two rare forms and says obtaining either is difficult.
Note: The breathing and destiny claims are historical assertions of the supplied text, not established descriptions of human physiology. The height unit is unconverted.
26. Why Am I Fearless in Battle Yet Overmatched Within the Palace?
The damaged opening contrasts strength within and without. Song Taizu is said to have had a small left eye and large right eye, hence fear of his wife. Minister Zhang's beard “at the left” is linked with lifelong fear of his lady. Your Majesty has many dark moles on the eyelids and therefore has obtained a capable mother of the realm. The answer groups eyelid moles, beard at the left and unequal, male-and-female eyes as three signs of fearing one's wife.
Note: The question and opening contrast are irregular as supplied; the personal examples are source attributions.
27. What Does the Length of a Woman's Pubic Hair Mean for Rank?
The source says Han Empress Dowager Lü had pubic hair one chi and eight cun long, yellow-gold at the roots and curled over the genitals, extending beyond the knees when drawn out. It calls this Gold Coins Adorning Yin and assigns it the highest rank and also sexual excess. Straight, long, black growth is instead attributed to a treacherous, murderous woman whose rank will not last. Yellow and soft growth is favored and can form a noble configuration. Grass-like or hard growth is assigned low standing, early growth short life and late growth sexual excess. The final line favors its arising within “three sevens,” followed by an irregular graph.
Note: These anatomical and moral claims are the historical source's, not established criteria of health or worth. The length is unconverted, and the closing age/unit wording is not silently repaired.
28. Why Use Bird and Beast Forms as Well as the Five Phases?
Guo Linzong's physiognomy is said to have three hundred and sixty outward forms, too many principles to remember at once. Beast forms mostly mean wealth, bird forms rank. A dragon form is subtly concealed; a tiger form has broad steps and a withdrawn head. A monkey form has round pupils, yellow ears, small nose and head, and a quick, unsettled nature. Fortune may arise for a time, with favorable wealth, stipend and lifespan, but old age is not readily promised the same.
A turtle form is slow in nature and often timid. Upright eyes, an exposed nose, long neck, rounded shoulders and upright body fit it; a woman with it is also called noble. Long tongue, even lips, large nose, long face and broad body make an ox form, assigned ease throughout life and ten thousand in gold. The rhapsody says a phoenix form needs elegant eyes and the source's “middle form” round pupils, calling these a yin and yang pair of great rank. Sparrow steps and snake form are strongly disapproved of in both sexes; chicken and rat eyes are linked with punishment and injury.
The damaged ending links standing and continually changing hooves with lifelong toil. It then joins pig form, red eyes, worry and entangling nets, “not duck steps,” a slanted, thick body, a broad mouth, movement and a raised head, without a clear continuous account.
Note: The middle-form word and broken animal ending are retained as supplied. Neither a missing animal name nor an additional definite prediction is invented.
29. How Are the Three Divisions Applied to Face and Body?
On the face, hairline to Mountain Root is the upper division and early period. The nose tip is the middle period; philtrum to chin the lower division, governing later years. A short, pared upper division means unfavorable youth; a low, sunken middle division lack of lifelong glory; a long lower division lifelong worry and obstruction. Broadly, the text favors long upper and middle divisions and a short lower one.
The bodily divisions are neck, waist and feet, all requiring proportionate matching. Equal Three Divisions are said to mean no lifelong lack of clothing and stipend; Five Peaks facing and returning toward one another flourishing wealth. They are also called the Three Powers: Heaven, Earth and Human.
30. What Is Said of a Person Without a Beard?
The beard is called the shoot of the source's “buttock channel” and the dantian's original spirit. Water forms often have Kidney deficiency; Earth forms insufficient dantian. These two forms are therefore said often to lack beards. With beards they are promised good sons: turbidity means wealth, clarity rank. No beard is explained as insufficient Kidney Water and weak primal qi, followed by the question of how there could be children.
A Wood form has flourishing Fire and is therefore said to lack a beard. The next following-beard/having-children clause is unclear. An irregular sentence about using beard to judge descendants warns against misleading an important matter. The quoted book then directs Wood forms to head hair for heirs, and Water and Earth to head hair for posterity.
Note: The opening writes the buttock rather than Kidney graph. The unclear child-related clauses and the verse's repeated head-hair word are not silently corrected to make a uniform beard rule.
31. Why Does the Body Develop While Hair Falls Out?
Flesh is said to grow with wealth and hair to follow the clearing of spirit. Hair is the surplus of blood: turbid hair accompanies withered blood, elegant hair flourishing blood. Hair loss is linked with wealth arising and flesh growing. In a Wood form, however, hair loss is declared a certain death sign.
The quoted verse links flesh growing and wealth becoming ample with naturally sparse hair, withered blood and turbid spirit with tangled silk-like hair, and beard and hair loss in a Wood form, with further hair loss, with the return of lifespan. The repeated hair-loss wording is retained.
32. What Are the Bright and Flourishing Three Yang?
Three Yang and Three Yin lie beneath both eyes, also called Sleeping Silkworms, Palace of Sons and Daughters and Palace of Fortune and Virtue: these are the Three Yang below the eyes. The face's Three Yang are Seal Hall, nose tip and cheekbones, essential regions of the face. They should therefore be open and flourishing, not obstructed or dark.
33. Why Are Forehead Lines Common in Great Ministers Yet Called Unfavorable?
One forehead line is the Canopy, two the Reclining Moon, three the Reclining Rhinoceros; more are called unfavorable. Lines should rise from Auxiliary Bones and Borderlands, deep and transverse. Canopy means solitude, Reclining Moon middle rank, Reclining Rhinoceros great rank. Short or confused lines are judged highly unfavorable and linked with lifelong toil, low standing, punishment and injury.
34. Why Does Physiognomy Speak of Qi and Color?
The quoted book says bone structure establishes, qi and color determine. Qi and color are the surplus radiance of the five zang and six fu, hence the detailed account of the phases. What is outside is called qi, inside color. Color is the shoot, qi the root; to examine the root, first examine the shoot. What remains within has not yet been encountered; what is outside has been encountered. Fresh brightness is currently flourishing, pale color already dispersed.
For a plan or request, examine qi and color in its palace. The author attributes to this an unpredictable mechanism beyond ghosts and spirits, drawing Heaven and Earth's refined qi, and calls qi and color the most effective of the world's unusual arts. He warns that deafness, blindness and careless claims make it ineffective.
35. Where Are a Woman's Blood and Qi Observed?
Women are read primarily through blood. Skin houses blood, blood is skin's foundation; examining skin is said to reveal blood's decline or flourishing. Bright skin-blood is moist; red withered, yellow turbid, scarlet declining and white obstructed. Turbidity is linked with low standing, sexual excess and early death. Blood should therefore be fresh and bright; clarity and moistness within and without are called noble.
Note: The source distinguishes the red and scarlet words and assigns them different adverse descriptions. They are not merged into a single favorable-color rule.
36. Where Is the Essence Said to Govern Men Observed?
The body's foundation is essence and spirit; once spirit scatters, the author asks how life could remain. The eyes lead the Five Phases, so looking there is said to suffice. Nurtured essence and spirit manifest in both eyes: elegant eyes, elegant spirit-heart; clear eyes, clear spirit-heart; withered, turbid eyes, withered, turbid spirit-heart; scattered eye radiance, scattered spirit-heart. Spirit is primary in the eyes, the body's concentrated brilliance, which should be elegant.
Sun and Moon like meteors are linked with personal glory; eyes like blind pupils with hardship. Concealment without exposure, slant, sinking or floating radiance is called beautiful. Any one defect is declared unfavorable. The quoted verse places the whole body's spirit in the eyes, promises glory to bright lacquer-like pupils, and assigns scorched-yellow, confused, turbid eyes poverty and low standing.
37. What Is Said of Prosperity Gained Through a Wife?
The book calls the Jian Gate a mirror and links it with becoming wealthy and founding a household through a wife. A full, high nose tip means marrying a capable, worthy wife. Prosperity through marriage is linked with a bright, moist nose tip and Fish Tail. Much wealth from the wife is linked with silkworm-like purple qi in the Seal Hall. A small, pale Turtle Head is said to mean worthy wives and concubines.
A woman's moist Seal Hall and clear brows are said to prosper her husband and benefit children after marriage; a level face and purple lips bring abundant fortune and stipend. Thus it is not only the man's configuration that gains wealth through his wife: the woman's configuration must also prosper the husband for the two to correspond.
38. Why Can a Wife's Wealth Be Followed by Poverty?
Loss of wealth after marrying is attributed to empty Kitchen and Stove regions; family ruin to a Jian Gate capable of holding a finger, glossed as sunken. An adverse bodily pattern means losing the household after taking a wife. Many Fish Tail lines mean lifelong poverty. The source next says much bone and falling flesh in old age, followed by a line about lifelong acquisition of a worthy wife.
A woman with a low nose is said to bring great ruin to her husband's household. Patches and dots on a man mean losing life and family through marriage. If the man does not incur these and the woman does not incur harmful restraint, their lives may be preserved. The text remarks that inequality is the nature of things and attaches a broken short-life phrase. A man may have a wife who harms him; an unfavorable woman's configuration carries its own husband-harming signs. A low nose bridge and little spirit and qi are assigned such a woman; little spirit and a low bridge are denied long life, while high cheekbones and a broad forehead are declared signs of harming the husband.
Note: The worthy-wife line and the broken remark on inequality and short life remain as supplied rather than being rewritten to fit the adverse context.
39. Can a Father's Household Be Ruined by a Son's Configuration?
To know ruin in old age, examine chin and scalp; to know children's glory, examine nipples, navel and abdomen. These are said to settle the course. A pared, sunken chin and dry, withered scalp make filial children doubtful in old age. Downward-facing breasts, thin abdominal skin and a shallow navel mean a ruinous son in later years. With an otherwise favorable face but these unfavorable features, the closing damaged sentence describes days difficult to pass, decline, death and eventual ruin. The author calls this the father's own unfavorable late-life configuration.
Note: The timing clause before and after death is incomplete as supplied; a precise sequence is not invented.
40. What Is Said of Receiving Rank Through a Son?
Round nipples, firm breasts and frost-like ears are linked with receiving a son's rank. Broad, thick neck skin and raised Sleeping Silkworms mean a son serving at court. Noble sons require paired pillow-bone peaks; elegant offspring a deep navel and hanging abdomen. Paired honors in old age require thick cheekbone and back regions and a full waist. “Feeding on the child's heavenly thought” is linked with harmonious skin and moist blood. Reading a parent honored through office does not depend on one region alone; all these are promised glory.
The quoted verse joins broad neck, thick skin, bright blood, thick abdomen, deep navel, level waist and back, subtle Sleeping Silkworms, purple-like lips and moist Earth facing Heaven, promising titles to father and son.
Note: The phrase rendered heavenly thought writes a thought word in this source; it is not silently changed to a different favor or grace word.
41. Must Both Partners Be Solitary If They Have No Children?
The quoted lines say:
The man's configuration has children, the woman's none;
Unless a concubine is taken to continue the clan's branch.
The woman's configuration has births; the man's following not-mouth clause is damaged;
Growing old together, they lament their solitude.
Note: The supplied verse is compressed and broken, especially its third clause. A missing marital or reproductive prediction is not invented.
42. Can an Unfavorable Husband and Fortunate Wife, or the Reverse, Match?
The book says a husband follows his wife's rank and a wife her husband's: the same principle. If the husband is unfavorable but the wife's configuration wealthy, he may rely on her to preserve himself. A common saying places the fortune of a household in one person. Hence people choose husbands, and even more carefully choose wives. Lifespan is said to be allotted in the prior endowment at birth, while wealth and rank can indeed be supported through another.
43. Can a Wealthy Son's Configuration Establish a Household When the Father's Is Unfavorable?
A son who establishes a household in later years is described as follows. Even with an unfavorable whole facial pattern, Sleeping Silkworms with the source's old/moist wording and high nipples are said to yield such a son. Raised Borderlands and a delicate chin mean a son who establishes himself later. A broad Seal Hall and both brows showing their quality are linked with founding a household and aiding the state. Full Four Storehouses and upright ear rims mean a son glorifying grandfather and father. Outstanding household establishment requires a round head and broad forehead; wealth accumulated from one's own beginnings thick Earth and high cheekbones.
Note: The old/moist description is retained without supplying a different adjective.
44. Where Is a Bad Heart Read in an Otherwise Substantial Face?
The book calls eyes the heart's shoots: good eyes a good heart, harmful eyes a harmful heart, elegant eyes an elegant heart. This is said to distinguish wisdom, folly, goodness and evil at a glance. For the heart's field, examine the Yin–Yang Palace, defined here as three fen below the Sleeping Silkworms. A good heart has it level, a benevolent heart full, a bad heart deep, concealed malice and harm to others blue-green. Blue-green sinews or red vessels there are denied a good person's configuration.
In women, a deep, blue-green, dark region is linked with disrespect to parents-in-law, discord with neighbors, disorder and greed, no good children and failure to establish a household. Fullness instead means noble sons, much benefit to the family and longer life. In men, fullness is said to preserve descendants' fortune and longevity. The verse links full Yin–Yang flesh with great fortune, intelligence and wisdom. It then speaks of having practiced yin–yang and saving people, with silkworm lines rising above, calling this hidden virtue.
Note: The source's practiced-yin–yang phrase is not silently rewritten as another term. The location measure remains a historical unit.
45. Where Is a Son's Lack of Filial Conduct Read?
A high chest and tapering buttocks are denied affectionate father-son relations. Reddish hair and yellow beard are denied filial reputation; thick lips are called filial and righteous. Moving lips and sparse teeth are questioned as filial signs. Chicken pupils and snake eyes are attributed concealed malice. A wasp-like neck, rabbit head, the obscure fox/solitary-gong phrase, grinding and clenching teeth, glaring and shaking the head are assigned a son who violates human relations.
Note: The fox/solitary-gong clause is broken as supplied.
46. Where Is a Minister's Disloyalty Read?
High cheekbones and a large nose tip are called signs of a loyal, upright minister; sunken eyes and high brows signs of greed. Round eyes with upright radiance are said to bear the ruler's troubles. White beard and red lips mean repaying the state even in death as a departed spirit. Small ears and pointed cheeks are assigned lifelong craftiness and miserliness. Disloyalty and lack of filial conduct are attributed to sunken Water and slanted Earth. A square face and upright beard are called truly loyal; a sunken face treacherous and secretly harmful.
47. A Lifetime's Stipend
The quoted book says that to eat a noble person's stipend one must have noble teeth, and to obtain noble clothing a noble body. Red, moist lips with matching upper and lower parts mean lifelong wine and food without lack. An exposed nose tip and slanted storehouses are questioned as a way to obtain a share of wealth.
Note: The question's closing comparison is incomplete. This same passage occurs twice in the supplied source, and both records are retained.
48. A Lifetime's Stipend
The quoted book says that to eat a noble person's stipend one must have noble teeth, and to obtain noble clothing a noble body. Red, moist lips with matching upper and lower parts mean lifelong wine and food without lack. An exposed nose tip and slanted storehouses are questioned as a way to obtain a share of wealth.
Note: The question's closing comparison is incomplete. This same passage occurs twice in the supplied source, and both records are retained.
49. What Is Said of Configurations of Early Death?
Do not call a form favorable because it is beautiful. Early death is often assigned deficient spirit, floating color, tight skin, weak bones, unequal flesh and blood, unmatched Five Offices, eyes without spirit, an unresonant voice and resonance not responding in the throat. A wholly favorable face without sufficient spirit is not readily promised long life. Withered, weak spirit and uneven qi are denied longevity. Short spirit shortens lifespan; short qi shortens its duration. In all lifespan judgments, spirit is primary.
50. Why Can a Plain-Looking Person Be Very Intelligent?
This is clarity within turbidity, as distinct from turbidity within clarity, which the text says people have not distinguished. With turbid bodily color and slanted Five Peaks, a level Seal Hall is taken as the School Hall of Fortune and Virtue. Complete ear rims and contours are the Outer Hall, clear, elegant pupils the Hall of Intelligence, white teeth the Inner Hall. These Four Halls are not rejected because appearance is plain: they are clarity within turbidity, linked with exceptional intelligence and ministerial office.
The quoted verse praises upright ears, eyes clear as blue-green waves, aligned white teeth and harmonious qi, saying that despite much plainness the person holds strategies absent in ten thousand others.
51. Why Can a Handsome Person Have a Clouded Mind?
This is turbidity within clarity. A handsome person with straight ears but eyes lacking spirit, teeth lacking alignment, disharmonious qi and much confused spirit is called a configuration that accomplishes nothing.
52. Why Can a Martial Configuration Hold Civil Office, or a Civil One Military Office?
Lord Bao's face is given seven hollows and three raised cheekbone regions, followed by an unclear ji/body-shining-like-jade phrase. The source's Fifth/Sixth Young Master has a silver face and golden eyes, hence the rank of an enfeoffed lord. Lord Bao's iron face, silver teeth and chief-ministerial cheekbones are then mentioned. Wu Zixu's features resemble a beautiful woman's, explained through brows dividing like the eight character. Grand Commandant Dang has a blue-green face and red beard but elegant eyes, so instead becomes a civil minister.
The source calls these four ancients complete in civil and military talent, fit to command armies and serve as ministers. They must not be judged simply through clarity and turbidity.
Note: The broken ji clause and Fifth/Sixth Young Master label are not silently supplied with a different person's name; the source's stated count of four remains as given.
53. Why Can the Sick Recover While the Unill Die?
These two concern qi and color alone, not structural appearance. Five qi/color signs in a sick person are said to mean death: 1. withered Mountain Root; 2. black ear rims; 3. dark Life Gate; 4. blue-green eye corners; 5. yellow mouth corners. The book says black surrounding Taiyang defeats Physician Lu's rescue, and blue-green covering the mouth corners Bian Que's treatment. Other mixed, dark, obstructed, blue-green or yellow colors are called merely illness colors.
If the nose tip brightens, the source says even the dying return to life; a bright Life Gate means health before many days; opening Year and Longevity regions put adversity far away. Indigo-like Three Yang are declared certain death, yet bright Year and Longevity may still offer rescue. If one of these five places opens, the person does not die.
For someone whose qi and color are always dark, one day of brightness is said to mark the death time; habitual brightness suddenly turning dark likewise marks death. The sick in such circumstances are said certainly to die. Red arising at Year, Longevity and Three Yang is assigned death within ten days. White issuing in the Seal Hall and yellow at the mouth mean death within one seven, seven days. Four Walls like smoke with red radiance require guarding against two sevens, fourteen days. An old person whose whole face shows yellow radiance is said not to escape one seven, seven days; a young person with blue-green at the mouth corners is assigned one month.
For the sick, the nose tip may be unmoistened, but death is read through muddy Year and Longevity. The next words about ears growing “deer” and further disease are unclear. Red ear rims bring worries in all matters. A black Seal Hall means either death or grave disease; blue-green cheekbones great calamity. Radiant blood color throughout the body means a smooth year; skin-blood obstructed like mud an unfavorable half-year.
Note: These are historical prognostic claims. The reversals between brightness as rescue and sudden brightness as death remain distinct, and the supplied ear/deer wording is not silently replaced with another sign.
54. Why Can Someone of Highest Office Lack Food and Clothing at Death?
In old age, regardless of former wealth and rank, skin-Earth is primary. Moist skin-Earth of the old head and sufficient blood color are said to leave a prosperous later prospect with great abundance. Dry skin-Earth and declining blood color in old age mean an official retiring into poverty, an ordinary person hardship, and even final affairs after death difficult to settle.
55. Why Do Low Sleeping Silkworms and Downward Breasts Mean No Children and Poverty in Old Age?
The answer attributes both to weak skin-Earth and unflourishing blood: only then do Sleeping Silkworms lower and breasts face downward. It asks how, with favorable moist blood color, these regions could instead sink or turn down.
56. Why Can Lifelong Bad Fortune End in Ease?
A failed facial pattern, uneven stars and unsettled regions are said to produce lifelong toil without half a day's rest; the opening also mentions hardship in old age. Settled spirit and flourishing blood, however, are not structural appearance. Late-life fortune is read only through skin color, blood and qi. Good spirit, qi and blood mean a favorable outcome even without a favorable course. Withered skin color is declared the arrival of death.
The book says to examine skin, hair, blood and qi in the old: all four favorable mean personal glory, while withered skin and weak blood mean return to darkness within a year.
57. Why Can Complete Offices and a Sound Body Still End in Poverty?
This is favorable course and form but unfavorable qi and color. The source contrasts a clear Heaven with Sun and Moon failing to brighten, and says that without qi and color a person's course does not open. Good bones, outward form and regions are insufficient for distinction if qi and color are unfavorable. Only bright qi and moist color permit free passage. Obstructed qi lasts nine years, obstructed color three, clouded spirit a lifetime. All three dark mean hardship into old age: favorable regions still do not bring distinction. Qi and color are therefore primary, while the source assigns lifelong poverty and low standing to bone structure.
58. Why Can an Unfavorable Pattern Still Gain Great Wealth?
Even after gaining wealth, the source says loss will follow. This concerns unfavorable regions with favorable qi and color. When qi and color respond, none fails to advance. Proportioned regions establish the household when their course arrives; fresh, bright, moist color makes that year's wishes attainable. Regions determine the year's favorable and adverse outcomes, qi and color that month's fortune or misfortune.
A broken comparison joins unfavorable affairs, qi and color, fine jade not leaving the mountain and vain work on the mountain. A broken boat with a following wind can still cross the sea. The quoted verse says slanted regions with bright qi and color let ventures follow one's wishes; if qi and color darken again, the person returns to toil and hardship.
Note: The jade/mountain sentence is incomplete and has not been rewritten into a definite additional rule.
59. Which Is Accurate: Bones, Regions, Form and Spirit, or Qi and Color?
Bones determine lifelong poverty and wealth; regions lifelong growth and decline; form and spirit changes; qi and color the year's fortune and misfortune. All four are called accurate, each with its own use. Examine each of the preceding thirty-six methods and the author claims none fails to respond.
Qi and color change with the times. The later accounts prescribe annual generation and restraint, monthly palace divisions and daily qi/seasons. A matter responding in a palace is assigned its month and day of attainment, a direction for seeking and a direction to avoid. Attentive use of the methods is claimed to surpass the reckoning of ghosts and spirits and seize Heaven's mechanism.
60. If Form Is Easy to Read but Qi and Color Difficult, How Are They Distinguished?
Form has myriad transformations: how could it be easy? Qi and color are only one principle: why call them difficult? Repeatedly reading appearances without true transmission and substantial learning makes a hair's breadth become a thousand-mile error. Without knowing palace divisions, generation and restraint, contrary principles or discernment, one cannot distinguish qi, color, fortune, misfortune, the direction of escape or the day of manifestation. Without the formulas, full understanding is difficult. For clarity, the author directs close study of the mysterious rhapsody recorded later.
61. What Is Said of Women Who Prosper or Ruin Their Husbands?
A woman who prospers her husband has a thick back and rounded shoulders; one who harms him high cheekbones and a small nose. Although women's readings have regions, Twelve Palaces, Five Offices, Six Storehouses and Three Divisions, this passage takes four things for use: forehead for parents, nose for husband, mouth for the Child Star, followed by a broken lowly-eyes/nobility phrase. First examine the nose tip as Husband Star. For completion and noble children, lips must match and have many interlacing marks; children winning fame require phoenix eyes. Prospering the husband and founding an estate require no deficiency in the whole face. Six Parings and Three Points are denied household establishment. A face like lustrous jade is promised a qilin-like child.
A household-establishing woman has matched Three Divisions, one enjoying fortune an upright forehead and clear brows. The author asks whether there could be a widow with a round nose tip or a noble woman with a tapering mouth. A noble husband is linked with fragrant body and upright form. Sexual excess and disorder are assigned facial patches and a small nose. A light body and heavy feet often mean a secondary consort. Restless body and shaking head bring the unclear skirt-and-hairpin-behind-a-screen phrase. A moist, disciplined mouth, round, grave face and authoritative spirit are linked with forcibly taking over the husband's management.
Large eyes, high pupils and an upright nose are called signs of prospering the husband; upright Earth and clear spirit of bringing fortune. Moist blood, radiance and elegance concealed in the eyes promise fine children. A large face without cheeks is denied fortune and virtue. Snow-white flesh is assigned low standing and sexual excess, cotton-soft flesh the same throughout life. Round eyes, pared head and much slippery skin mean either prostitution or becoming a nun. White lips, pointed mouth and yellow hair mean either a matchmaker or concubine. A round nose tip and moist blood establish the household; a small tip and low bridge bring ruin after marriage.
Note: The eye/nobility and screen phrases are unclear as supplied; the marital and moral judgments remain historical assertions.
62. Can a Child's Rank Be Read Before Its Bones Have Formed?
The bones are not formed, but Five Offices, Six Storehouses and Three Divisions are already established. Voice and spirit remain primary. A ringing voice and gentle appearance mean a household-establishing son; upright Five Offices and star-like eyes a child of great rank. Thick, loose skin and flesh mean fortune and longevity; tight, floating skin poverty and early death. A clear, resonant voice benefits both parents; an imposing voice with coarse qi is not readily promised longevity.
High brows and straight ears mean an intelligent, elegant child; low brows and ears often a monk or Daoist. A broad forehead and Seal Hall receive the father's fortune; an upright nose and high bridge establish the family estate. The verse promises much fortune to high brows and thick ears, rank to a broad forehead and rounded cheeks.
Before ten, the child should be clear in body, upright in form, sufficient in qi and strong in spirit to become useful. Paring, thinness and slanting are called failures to form. A round head is categorically denied short life, a moist mouth poverty; thick skin is promised longevity, weak bones denied settled glory. A pared Heavenly Division and dark ear rims mean hardship in youth; a sunken Mountain Root and low Luo and Ji difficulty keeping wealth. Low ears and brows are dismissed as grounds for asking about study; upright ears and clear pupils permit achievement to be discussed. A broken voice and dark color mean a wealth-destroying son; clear qi and bright color a prosperous person.
63. Which Sizes and Proportions Are Disapproved of Among the Five Offices?
All Five Offices should be upright, level and proportioned, not slanted, sunken, small or pared. A moist mouth and red lips are favored, knots on the nose bridge disapproved of. Large eyes must not expose spirit, large ears especially must be upright and thick. A small nose makes wealth difficult to accumulate; a small mouth means lifelong lack of grain. Brows should be high, not low. Eyes should not be small or slanted; mouth not pointed, lips not thin.
Small eyes do not reject light brows, large eyes do not reject heavy ones. Without cheekbones a large nose is unsuitable; a large face especially must not have a low bridge. A moist mouth should not expose teeth; large eyes should not expose radiance. Heavy brows should not accompany the source's large-skin wording; small ears especially fear broad brows.
Note: The large-skin word is not silently replaced with a different facial region.
64. What Are Generation and Restraint in the Five Phases?
A Wood form favors a Water pattern, an Earth form obtaining Metal is exceptional, and a Fire form favors Wood. A Wood person developing is declared certain to become wealthy, a Metal person with red moistness glorious. Water in the west means rank; Wood encountering Metal poverty. An Earth form becoming thin is declared certain death, a Metal form becoming fat difficulty surviving. Water rejects Earth's restraint, and a Metal form with a red nose tip incurs much punishment and injury.
Resembling Wood without being Wood is denied rank, resembling Metal without being Metal glory. Resembling Water without being Water is instead favorable, and resembling Earth without being Earth brings settled glory. Restraining relations are strongly disapproved of; generation and support can bring personal glory.
Note: These qualifications are retained alongside the differing statements in the earlier Five Phases account, not harmonized into a new rule.
65. Why Can Having a Child Coincide with Harm to Husband or Wife?
The book links having a child and harming the wife with Fish Tail lines reaching the Heavenly Storehouse: the child is established, the wife lost. Yellow radiance at the Jian Gate with lines to the Heavenly Storehouse likewise means a child with harm to the wife. Lines at the Jian Gate mean wife-harming restraint; yellow radiance a jian child, using the source's word for illicit or treacherous.
The next quotation has the broken phrase “seeing a child, harming lips,” then high cheekbones, sunken pupils and a level Seal Hall, followed by an unclear skin/child-and-chastity clause and a weak nose, low bridge and wife like fire. It asks how high cheekbones and sunken eyes in a woman could fail to harm the husband. A level Seal Hall means children; the nose is Husband Star and sinking there necessarily harms him. Red lips mean children. Red pupils in a woman mean having a child and harming the husband; yellow pupils in a man harm wife and children.
The closing lines place “harming the wife, producing children” beside moist blood at Sleeping Silkworms and a blue-green Fish Tail, then “harming children and wife” beside a bright, moist Jian Gate and weak Sleeping Silkworms.
Note: The lip and skin/child phrases are retained as damaged wording. The compressed closing conditions are kept in their supplied order without inventing firmer boundaries between them.
66. Why Is a Newborn Said to Harm Father or Mother?
Low-growing infant hair is said to harm the father, whorls at Sun and Moon the mother. Fine cold hairs at the corners mean losing both parents young; spiral brows harm the mother. Father-harming signs are a slanted head and pared forehead, mother-harming signs sunken eyes and joined brows. Yellow birth hair raises fear of difficult rearing, black birth hair fear of harmful restraint.
The verse joins a pared forehead, slanted head and drooping Sun and Moon with harm to parents and peril; joined brows, sunken eyes and broken Mountain Root with a ruinous child.
67. Must One Broken Region Be Feared in an Otherwise Favorable Form?
Among the whole body's Twelve Palaces and thirty-six methods, one displaced or sunken region makes complete fortune difficult to promise. There are twelve methods in which an unfavorable feature arises amid beauty:
Note: This source record ends at the introduction. The intervening numbered cases are not supplied here.
12. Thick Palms Without Lines Are Linked with Folly and Low Standing
Any one of these twelve features is said to prevent advancement, even with Chen Ping's appearance and Zhang Liang's wealth. Therefore beauty and ugliness alone must not settle favorable judgment. The secret methods have multiplication and division unknown to people.
The verse describes a proud face, good Five Offices, level upright body and broad spirit and qi, but says that a small break within the pattern makes a whole life unaccomplished and all affairs difficult.
Note: Only the twelfth case survives in this record's heading, after the preceding introduction; cases one through eleven are absent here. The source's wealth word in the Zhang Liang comparison is not silently changed to talent.
68. What Are a Woman's Killing Stars That Harm Husband and Children?
The text gives seven killings, attributed to Dongbin and claimed repeatedly effective: 1. a beautiful woman with yellow pupils; 2. large face and small mouth; 3. lines on the nose; 4. turned-out ears without rims; 5. extreme beauty with a silver-colored face; 6. black hair without brows; 7. large pupils and coarse brows. Even with upright Five Offices and an otherwise complete face, any of these is said to harm the husband.
The quoted verse joins peach-blossom color and a silver face with beauty turning to resentment, harm to husband and children and no day of accomplishment, assigning such a woman to the flower streets and willow lanes.
Note: These moral and marital classifications are historical source assertions.
69. What Is the Gravity Said to Govern Women's Appearance?
Settled dignity and respect are called gravity; upright bodily form imposing bearing. Properly conducted affairs inspire awe at a glance. Upright sitting and standing, restrained speech, broad disposition, gentle expression, neither exulting in pleasure nor worrying in adversity are called signs of a noble woman in the world, eligible for honors through her son.
The verse praises upright body and level sitting and standing, dignity that astonishes others, broad conduct and disposition, and a son who pays homage to the sage ruler.
Note: The world-word in the supplied noblewoman phrase is irregular; no additional social category is inferred from it.
70. How Can Learning Hidden Within Be Known?
The book says brows gather the elegance of mountains and rivers and the chest stores Heaven and Earth's mechanisms. Eyes like blazing thunder and meteors imply great strategies to settle the state. Exceptional talent, centered teeth and red lips are joined with a worldly hermit unafraid of others and holding long strategies within.
Han Gaozu is said to have sought a hermit or Daoist. At the doorway the man did not rise. Gaozu said he had come to seek a worthy person who could settle the state. The account then has the man facing the sun and seeking the wind as he responds, answering every question fluently. Gaozu calls him a superior among superior scholars.
An ugly or strange form may conceal beautiful jade within stone. Brows, eyes, disposition and actions are said to reveal learning. Ear and Seal opening one cun are assigned a country-house elder; three raised cheekbone regions a frontier post. Eight-shaped divided brows can make a military officer. Storehouses round like a dou measure indicate a military commander. High shoulders and thick back mark an uncommon person; unusual forms and people may be marshals or generals.
Note: The hermit episode and its sun/wind clause are incomplete as supplied. No personal name or missing dialogue is invented; historical units remain unconverted.
71. If Excess Wine and Sexual Indulgence Obscure Qi and Color, How Are Outcomes Judged?
Excess wine is said merely to cause dryness and obstruction on the skin, excess sexual indulgence dryness and obstruction at Three Yang and Three Yin. An incomplete cannot/can clause then mentions calamity. In men, sexual indulgence is linked with blue-green Three Yang; in women blue-green Locking Yang bones. These alone, not other regions, are called the signs, and are said not to concern fortune and misfortune.
Before wine and sexual activity, their effects are said to remain within; afterward outside. The author still directs examining each office by the written methods and claims none fails. He asks how wine and sexual matters could be allowed to mislead an important judgment.
Note: The cannot/can wording is damaged. These are historical diagnostic assertions, not established physiological tests.
72. How Can a Person's Good or Evil Heart Be Seen?
The quoted book links a good heart with radiant Three Yang, concealed malice with deep Tear Halls, sunken Yin–Yang with harmful conduct, and inner treachery with blue-green mouth corners. It asks how slanted pupils could have an upright heart. Hawk cheeks and rat ears are assigned a treacherous strongman, red eyes and yellow pupils thorough harmfulness. Blue-green sinews and a pale face prompt a warning against living together. These features are called especially objectionable.
Another verse praises an upright mouth, even lips, high nose tip, moist Three Yang, red Seal Hall, harmonious face, soft speech and relaxed spirit. It links them with high standing and reputation respected by the world, calls this an exceptional upper pattern of fortune, and says people do not know the method.
73. How Can Misfortune Be Escaped?
Earth has east, south, west and north; people Five Phases; color five kinds. Much Water with peril is directed east for escape. Much Fire and trouble to Metal are directed north for peace. Weak Water and much Earth may go west to support the root. Fire restraining Metal is again directed north; Metal restraining Wood south. A whole face of Wood color should go to a Fire region, a whole face of Water color urgently east.
Broadly, opened qi and moist color permit seeking, planning and movement. Opened color but clouded qi favor remaining still. Manifestation in a palace determines a month; its current region is said to reveal the outcome of plans. Knowledge, caution and steadfast observance throughout life are said to avert adversity.
Note: These directional correspondences are translated as the text's historical rules, not current travel or safety guidance.
74. Heaven, Earth and Human
The master says: At first I traveled the province written Xi, then Jiangnan and later the capital, observing several hundred thousand beautiful and unusual appearances. I claim never to have misled anyone's affairs. Over several years at the window I made these three volumes, divided into Heaven, Earth and Human.
The upper volume is said to reveal rank, poverty and free passage, the middle the year's fortune, disaster and blessing, and the lower future favorable or adverse outcomes and descendants' flourishing or decline. All physiognomy is said to lie within forty-two formulas, with a Hundred Questions appended. Lord Gao's reading of the questions brought intuitive methods, examination of principles and inference of circumstances. Though he had repeatedly observed people, he did not equal Liuzhuang's marvelous physiognomy. A broken sentence links Gao, this book, Qin Dongshi, Zhang Yekuang and returning to the lake; the work is said no longer to have been transmitted. The original blocks and book are likewise said not to have circulated. Gao later exclaimed that in decades of study among unusual collections and books he had never encountered such clear illumination, suddenly understood the hidden mechanism, and composed the Plum Window Rhapsody.
Plum Window Rhapsody:
Great is the human body, a living form joining the one qi of Heaven and Earth. The master examines patterns and the strength and weakness of the Five Phases. One must inspect Twelve Palaces and know a hundred regions. Broadly examine the pattern; in detail, the Five Offices, form and spirit. Patterns must match, offices and storehouses be strong, qi and color balanced, regions moist, Three Divisions high and palaces level. Palaces must not be deficient or sunken, regions must not have the source's low-line defect.
A broken Wood/beam/Metal clause concerns fashioning beams and channels. Thick Water obtaining Earth is called a person of fortune and longevity; Fire restraining a Metal form is not readily promised longevity; Water generating Wood must achieve fame. The phases obtaining generation and flourishing bring personal distinction; one pattern losing its enclosure is denied lifelong glory.
A round head and elegant hair mean a lofty, clear-minded scholar. The damaged xiu-lower clause with a hanging abdomen is assigned ease. High brows and raised ears bring admiration into old age; moist Seal Hall and high bridge lifelong closeness to distinguished people. A large nose tip means a heart holding virtue; a low bridge ruined ancestral property and departure from the clan. Large eyes without radiance mean criminal punishment. Large ears and a pinched mouth mean return to darkness at four nines, thirty-six.
A large nose especially must not expose its openings; a large mouth needs clear corners. Yellow pupils are strongly disapproved of in both sexes, red lips favored in both. A sunken face often harms close kin; high cheekbones are linked with wrongdoing. Matching storehouses promise chief ministerial office; bright rims and Supporter region first-rank attendance at court. Raised Borderlands promise wealth; dark Four Walls bring an unclear Luo-fine fault. A small nose and large face are discouraged from seeking profit; low brows and sunken eyes assigned lifelong toil. Empty Stove and sunken storehouses are denied a time for fortune. Withered scalp and unmoistened blood mean return to darkness within a year.
Radiance shining over the whole face is here assigned low standing and ignorance. Even, clear whiskers and brows growing beyond the eyes mean upright conduct and a worthy wife. A long upper division means lifelong abundance, a long middle ample wealth and stipend, a moist lower division ministerial rank. A woman's face without Killing signs, even with cheekbones, can still make a titled lady. The next broken sentence joins a sunken nose, a child “without brain,” and longevity described as not flourishing. Daily “flourishing spirit” is then attributed to floating sinews and exposed bones; constant effort to dark blood and coarse skin.
Pointed buttocks and small thighs are denied a settled place. Clouded spirit and dark eyes mean middle-age ruin and loss of the household. Floating eye radiance in a woman is linked with the source's floating fault and illicit affairs. Exposed bridge knots mean harmful restraint in women, ruin in men and lifelong poverty. A pointed head and pared forehead bring lifelong travel; a slanted waist and thin skin solitude in old age. Raised lips and exposed teeth mean early death; slanted eyes and a broken root low standing and treachery.
High cheekbones require matching upper and lower regions; a large tip and forehead aligned Wells and Stoves. A household-establishing son has round cheeks and thick flesh, a ruinous son turned-out ears and raised brows. A household-managing woman has a level back and moist waist, a disordering one a fine, light body. Crookedness is denied fortune. A pointed mouth and white lips bring early punishment at thirty. A favorable whole face with a pointed waist is assigned sexual disorder; a level Seal Hall and thick lips in a plain face extraordinary children. Flourishing spirit in a child is declared free of fear from barriers and killing influences; a clear voice in a woman suited to a good husband.
First- and second-rank unusual forms are difficult to distinguish at once. Third and fourth ranks have a level Seal Hall, sufficient qi and clear spirit; fifth through eighth a round head, hanging abdomen and thick, full back. Five Long and Five Short must match, Five Large and Five Small be proportioned. Although appearance is one whole, its distinctions are myriad and not instantly separable; further discussion is needed for clarity.
The master wished to return to his fields, accepting no titles, stipends, gold or silk. The stipend word here is written with the green graph. Yongle granted a hundred green willows and a hundred mu of fertile fields, allowing retirement in Zhe-Yue and bestowing the title Master Liuzhuang. Lord Gao later missed him and sought an imperial command. Nine summons did not bring him to court, so Gao went to Zhe-Yue himself. He saw the immortal estate beside green water, fertile fields around its doors, red flowers and green willows, emerald bamboo and winding pines. Moved beyond measure, he also saw golden letters hanging over the gate and red tablets standing at the entrance.
The verse says:
Deep stillness and clarity are said to keep fortune and misfortune from intruding; a damaged qi/harmony/separation clause then says no affair is pursued. Black qi piercing the Five Openings means falling among dark spirits; flourishing qi striking the Three Terraces stipend descending from Heaven. Officials encountering red are followed by an unclear joined/increasing phrase involving scholars and ordinary people. Red on both cheekbones means brothers competing as enemies. White qi at the Heavenly Division brings spring fears of disputes, punishment and killing; black clouds at Earth's broad region autumn fears of contention and lawsuits.
Yellow qi at the Jian Gate means marriage nevertheless forming through an illicit affair. Black clouds at the Wife region bring an obscure line about old acquaintances changing into thieves. Red invading the Wine Order is disapproved of: wine and sexual indulgence destroy life. Fiery radiance at the Yin Office means guarding against the wife's peril in childbirth. Blue-green beneath the eyes concerns wives, concubines, sons and daughters. White qi growing at the nose tip means harmful restraint involving parents and brothers. Red meeting central Earth color ends in disaster; blue-green and yellow spirit-color, even with red, are said to bring little worry.
Black mist at Heaven's Center means retirement or loss of office; black at the Seal Hall worry over removal. Yellow at Year means official investiture; red at Longevity conflict and restraint involving the wife. Red-black transverse lines at Year mean worry either over parents or one's own lifespan. Yellow color and red clouds there bring one joy over descendants and another over the source's green/stipend word. White means death and mourning, red official disaster, black worry over illness, blue-green fright and humiliation. Black beneath the eyes brings lawsuits; bright yellow above the brows fortune. Oil-smeared black is linked with much injury to life; yellow like crumbly earth with gathered wealth. Red and yellow entering the face often mean an imperial grant of gold and silk.
Black mist at Year responds to Heaven's Prison and trouble arising through officialdom. Blue-green Fish Tail means an illicit affair failing; a bright yellow nose tip completion of rank and stipend. Black connecting to Year brings a woman disaster; blue-green entering the philtrum a man's failed enterprise. Calamity and mourning arise from white at the head, worries and illness often at brows and hair. Bright yellow makes office easy to seek; dark nostrils make affairs difficult. A separate line mentions contention over servants and horses. Yellow in the Tear Hall is followed by a not-obtaining phrase with its object missing.
A dark mole in the Dragon Palace harms a son on the left, a daughter on the right; white radiance above the brows harms father on the left, mother on the right. A red Mountain Root and eyes like fire mean bloodshed adversity. Black cloud qi responding at the Heavenly Peak means worries over wine, food and sexual desire. Seeking office or promotion requires bright Three Terraces; lost wealth and official disaster come with darkness among the Five Peaks. Small requests bringing great gain are attributed to distinct Heavenly Court corners; accomplishment without toil to brightness and moistness around the Orchid Terrace on four sides.
Yellow in the Seal Hall like a willow leaf facing the Borderland is assigned third-rank ceremonial advancement within ninety days. High, broad purple qi already bright is followed by an obscure yao-center and one-year phrase. Military tallies and ministerial appointment accompany purple qi at the Traveling Horse; the subsequent forty-day clause mentions petty people and the hundred affairs without clear syntax. For monks and Daoists, a broken old-month/reaching-younger-brother phrase ends with response-in-the-year/afterward wording. The author concludes that a volume on qi and color judges these matters fully and should be examined closely.
Note: All destiny, character and medical assertions remain the historical source's claims. The stated forty-two formulas and Hundred Questions are not newly reconstructed. Broken travel/transmission names, Wood/beam/Metal and xiu-lower clauses, Luo-fine, child-without-brain and daily-flourishing-spirit wording, several color-verse phrases and its final timelines are disclosed rather than silently repaired. The yao-center graph, the green/stipend words and the missing Tear Hall object remain distinguishable from a supplied complete prediction. Historical acreage is not converted.
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