In the twelfth year of the reign of the sixth Emperor, the Scholar and Grand Preceptor of the ... clan professed a theory of five elements that soon afterwards came to be regarded as the orthodox. Up to that time, people believed that it was the transformations of Heaven and Earth that gave rise to substantial reality, but no one could explain how the two, in their eternal and mutual exchange of breath, could solidify into the diverse forms of the millions of things that may be observed, and how these things channeled that dynamic breath and so undergo transformations. And so he proposed that the breath of Heaven and Earth solidified in five phases as distinguished by the direction of the flow of that breath, and so he professed that all things were made up of Soil, Fire, Wind, Water or Aether.
When asked if the five elements are Deities, he said: No, they are not, they are only the names of forms that are brought forward by Heaven and Earth, which are Deities. When a soul is lodged in the body of a man, we do not say, 'the man is the soul', but 'the man is brought forward by the soul.' This is why, so they say, it is the matter of the soul that determines the form of the man, and not the other way around. Likewise with the five elements. Anyone who misinterprets what I say and builds shrines to the five elements, is not wise.
But when asked which one was the first to solidify, he said: Not which one, but which two, for Soil and Aether are coeval and depend on one another just as Heaven and Earth, for the former is the pure body of Earth and the latter, the pure body of Heaven.
But when asked which one was the next to solidify, he said: Wind, for it is what arises from the polarization of Heaven and Earth. When breath is in the one, it tends to flow to the other, and when in the other, to flow back to where it started in the one. The body of that breath is Wind itself, which is experienced as the feeling of motion from one place to another. For it has been observed by the watchers of weather that between a hot region and a cold region, the wind is strong, and the greater the difference between the hot and the cold, the stronger the wind. Likewise with Heaven and Earth.
But when asked which one was the next to solidify, he said: Again there are two, for Fire and Water are coeval. In the motions of breath between the two poles, the breath is caused to twist and turn, either twisting towards Earth or else turning towards Heaven. That which twists towards Earth becomes hot, but that which turns towards Heaven becomes cold. Hence the breath that twists towards Earth goes down and, to compensate for this motion, becomes light, causing it next to float up, and it is Fire. And further, where it floats up it becomes mountains, and where it floats up so much that it breaks through the Earth it becomes volcanoes. But the breath that turns towards Heaven goes up and, to compensate for this motion, becomes heavy, causing it next to sink down, and it is Water. The first manifestation of this downward movement is clouds, but where the breath is especially strong, the clouds will fall down as rain. There are also some times when the forceful movement of breath is caused to flip directions again in the midst of the upward or downward phase, and this manifests as Fire that precipitates from Heaven as lightning, and Water that gushes from the Earth as springs. Since this flow is irrational, the prediction of lightning and the divination of the location of springs cannot be accomplished by human means.
But when asked how the five elements gave rise to the millions of observable things, he said: All things arise in cycles within cycles within cycles, because breath tends naturally to curl in on itself, and thus are the larger motions repeated on a smaller scale. With each contortion, Heaven and Earth are replicated and with them the five elements, which are only identified by the direction of flow. At the inception of each cycle, whether big or small, the fundamental matter of the world is subtly transformed, but the disposition of its past states is retained. Thus with the passing of each cycle, something new comes into being but what is old is preserved. This is why for eons the number of things in the world was able to increase without changing the nature of the world itself, and so now we observe the millions of diverse forms of things, as trees and rocks, flowers and moss, birds and beasts. That they are similar is owing to the larger cycles, and when they differ it is due to the smaller ones. Fire and Water are, more specifically, the seeds of generation, as they are the sites of contortions that eventually cause the appearance of a new, smaller cycle. After the new cycle is incipiated, Fire and Water transmute into Heaven and Earth respectively and function as such for the new cycle. The new cycle then generates its own Wind, and later on its own Fire and Water, which once again cause another cycle to begin.
Finally, when asked how man emerged in the world, he said: The nature of man is already evident from what I have said before. And though his disciples were unsatisfied with this answer, he would not say more.
Someone heard this and offered his own interpretation. He said: The theory of the five elements describes the flow of breath, but it can also explain the flow of matter. Whereas breath flows in a circle, and so in the order of Soil-Aether, Wind, Fire-Water, matter flows in a straight line, in the order of Soil, Fire, Wind, Water and Aether. The matter at the bottom is more gross, while that at the top, more subtle, but the gross can be refined into the subtle by the intercession of intelligence, which is the guided patterning of matter. The production of things according to the cycles has given rise to trees and rocks, and birds and beasts, and finally, Man. But of the millions of observable things, those which exhibit corporeality are rocks, mountains, dirt and pebbles, hence they are Soil. Those which exhibit motion in addition to corporeality are trees, grass, flowers, vines and moss, hence they are Fire. Those which exhibit animation in addition to motion and corporeality are all the kinds of animals including man, hence they are Wind. Those which exhibit reflection in addition to the other three are another species of man, one that possesses a sound intellect, hence they are Water. And those which exhibit Perfect Virtue in addition to the other four are yet another species of man that is called the Sage, hence they are Aether. Man is, as far as I am aware, the only mortal creature capable of cultivate all five of these realms. All the higher-order beings, from immortals to great spirits and deities, are already made of Aether and are eternal and perfect.
His theory was repeated in every hall of learning in the Realm and it became the seed of many a stormy debate. The eminent scholars of the day could not decide whether the theory of the five elements as grades of refinement contradicted the previous theory which held them to be phases in endless transformation. Three factions emerged that claimed to have resolved the contradiction. The first faction assigned primacy to the five elements understood as flux and reduced refinement to an illusory phenomenon generated by the transformation of things. The second assigned primacy instead to the five elements understood as refinement and reduced flux to a preparatory function leading to final perfection. The third faction, which was founded by the man who had originally come up with the theory of the five elements as refinement, refused to reduce either refinement to flux or flux to refinement, but regarded both as complementary functions that sustained the selfsame principle. In the decades that followed, the first two factions increased their followers exponentially, even splitting into several sub-schools, while the third faction struggled to recruit disciples and eventually was abandoned.