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Purgation therapy has played an important role as a influential remedy from the begining of the Chinese medicine. Especially purgation therapy is raised as the effective remedy on the acute infectious disease in the book of ’Treatise on Febrile Disease’. But It was inclined to cold-nature and available only in the excess syndrome. Nevertheless it is evident that the book has showed an example of this therapy. During the middle age, purgation therapy is classified into several subtype; hydrogogue therapy, laxation with lubricants, purgation with cold-natured drugs and purgation with warm-natured drugs. Comparing with the ancient times, it must be a progression. It was investigated earnestly by a school leaded by Zhang Congzheng. They were not restricted to several diseases, but applied it to the wide range of diseases. They thought as following. ’One is ill from pathogenic factor so that you should eliminate it from the human body’. Hence, they frequently used three major remedies such as diaphoresis, emesis and purgation. In this process, purgation therapy had showed eye-opening progress. But opposition to it was not little. Li Gao was a representative man on the opposite side. He expressed a critical opinion and placed great importance on the genuine energy, the natural healing force. Under his influence, a large number of doctors evaded purgation and put it under taboo. On account of these trend, purgation therapy had took a backward step and retrograded. Therefore cathartics such as Rhei Radix et Rhizoma, Rharbitidis Semen, cold drugs such as Gypsum Fibrosum, etc. had been excluded for preservation of the genuine energy, and came about an obnoxious custom to value only ’tonity deficiency’, or ’warm and tonify’. As it had came into fashion to approach most disease from the point of view, purgation therapy was merely fall into a remedy of constipation. After the eighteenth century purgation therapy encountered the new period of rivival. It was introduced by them who strived for the study of Epidemics to the new current of thought, so called ’增水行舟’. It was because 온병 was apt to dissipate one’s Yin fluid. Therefore purgation therapy of this period was characterized by establishing nourishment Yin and body fluid with or without use of timely purgation of accumulation of heat. From the time of Zhang Congzheng, it was accomplished by Lee Je-ma to the most epoch-making change. He caused an improvement in the use of purgation therapy by regarding innate constitutional contradiction as importance than representing clinical symptoms. He warned that existing remedies that depend only upon symptoms and signs, not upon individual characteristics including constitutional features didn’t bring round to but kill them. And he understood all the pathologic processes in his constitutional theory, investigated specific drugs on four constitution, made indications of each prescriptions clear. For giving to differentiation of constition before differentiation of syndrom, his new slant on the pathologic phenomena overcome the limitations of 변증시치, and revaluate purgation therapy from remedy impaire the genuine energy to that restore it by recover the balance between the internal organ. It is the product of him to fundamentally upset the cause to be in disregard of purgation therapy.
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