Abstract
IN an article published in NATURE (vol. xxv. p. 82) on the opinions of the Chinese Emperor Khang-hi on certain natural phenomena, it will be remembered that the yang and yin, or the male and female principles of Chinese philosophy, played a conspicuous part. Japan, it is well known, adopted at a very early period in its history the law, polity, science, philosophy, and writing of the Chinese, and with them the yang and yin; and it may not be uninteresting to our readers to see how the doctrine of these dual forces, mutually repellent as well as attractive, has been employed to explain the facts of meteorology. A recent issue of the Japan Gazette newspaper of Yokohama contains the translation of a work written in 1821 by a certain Arai Yoshinari, called the “Ten-chi-jii; or, Ideas about Heaven and Earth.” The heavens, the writer says, are very high, the earth is very thick; we cannot ascend to the one or go down into the other; consequently man was unable for many generations to comprehend the phenomena of either; but now the opinions of all philosophers on this subject are based on the action and reaction of the male and female, the active and passive principles of nature upon each other. The rain is a changed form of the male, and the vapour under the earth of the female principle. When the male principle sinks into the earth it pursues the female. The earth is the mother of all things and the heaven is the air or wind where the sun, the moon, and the stars hang shining. There are two kinds of air—the heaven-air and the earth-air. The motion of the heavens is contrary to that of running water. The heavens move from east to west, while water runs from west to east. In some districts, indeed, water in the earth runs towards the north, but meets the earth-air which obstructs its flow, causes much agitation, and finally its complete evaporation from the surface of the earth. The vapour thus formed ascends and becomes clouds, which are again turned into rain by the action of the wind. The water has periods of increase and decrease according to the male and female seasons; thus in summer, which is the male season, water increases, while in winter, or the female season, it diminishes. Again, the earth-air is changed into rain when it moves from east to west; and therefore, previous to rain, we see a white vapour in the morning ascending in the east. “This is a clear proof of the earth's growing hot.” For the same reason mountains become somewhat darker just before rain.
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Some Primitive Ideas on Meteorology . Nature 26, 15–16 (1882). https://doi.org/10.1038/026015b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/026015b0