Qishou — Vital Force and Lifespan氣壽篇
凡人稟命有二品，一曰所當觸值之命，二曰強弱壽夭之命。所當觸值，謂兵燒壓溺也。強壽弱夭，謂稟氣渥薄也。兵燒壓溺遭以所稟為命，未必有審期也。若夫強弱夭壽以百為數，不至百者，氣自不足也。夫稟氣渥則其體強，體強則其命長；氣薄則其體弱，體弱則命短。命短則多病，壽短。始生而死，未產而傷，稟之薄弱也。渥強之人，不卒其壽，若夫無所遭遇，虛居困劣，短氣而死，此稟之薄，用之竭也。此與始生而死，未產而傷，一命也。皆由稟氣不足，不自致於百也。
In every case there are two kinds of destiny that a man receives. The first is the destiny of what he is bound to run into, and the second is the destiny of being strong or weak, long-lived or short-lived. What he is bound to run into means being killed by weapons, being burned, being crushed, being drowned. Being strong and long-lived or weak and short-lived means that the breath he received was thick or thin.
Weapons and fire and crushing and drowning are called destiny because a man meets them according to what he received, and there is not necessarily a fixed time for them. As for being strong or weak, short-lived or long-lived, a hundred is taken as the number, and those who do not reach a hundred are those whose breath was not sufficient from the first.
Now if the breath received is thick the body is strong, and if the body is strong the destiny is long. If the breath is thin the body is weak, and if the body is weak the destiny is short. When the destiny is short there is much sickness and the years are few. To die newly born, and to be hurt before ever being delivered, comes of what was received being thin and weak. When a man of thick and strong endowment does not finish out his years, it is that nothing has befallen him, but he lives idly and grows worn and low, and his breath runs short and he dies. This is his endowment being thin and the use of it being spent. This is one destiny with dying newly born and being hurt before delivery. In all of them the breath received was not sufficient, and of itself it did not reach a hundred.
人之稟氣，或充實而堅強，或虛劣而軟弱。充實堅強，其年壽；虛劣軟弱，失棄其身。天地生物，物有不遂。父母生子，子有不就。物有為實，枯死而墮。人有為兒，夭命而傷。使實不枯，亦至滿歲。使兒不傷，亦至百年。然為實兒而死枯者，稟氣薄，則雖形體完，其虛劣氣少，不能充也。兒生，號啼之聲鴻朗高暢者壽，嘶喝濕下者夭。何則？稟壽夭之命，以氣多少為主性也。婦人疏字者子活，數乳者子死。何則？疏而氣渥，子堅強；數而氣薄，子軟弱也。懷子而前已產子死，則謂所懷不活。名之曰懷，其意以為已產之子死，故感傷之子失其性矣。所產子死、所懷子凶者，字乳亟數，氣薄不能成也。雖成人形體，則易感傷，獨先疾病，病獨不治。
The breath that men receive is in some full and firm and strong, and in others empty and low and soft. When it is full and firm and strong the years are long, and when it is empty and low and soft the body is lost and thrown away. Heaven and earth give birth to things, and among things there are those that do not come through. Fathers and mothers give birth to children, and among children there are those that do not come to completion. A plant may set fruit and the fruit wither and die and fall, and a man may become a child and his destiny be short and he be hurt.
If the fruit were kept from withering it would fill out its year, and if the child were kept from hurt it would reach a hundred years. Yet fruit that has set and children that have been born do die and wither, and this is because the breath received was thin. Then though the body is whole, its empty and low breath is scant and cannot fill it out.
A child that is born and cries with a voice loud and clear and high and free lives long, and one whose voice is hoarse and sunken and low dies early. Why is this? Because in receiving the destiny of long life or early death, the amount of the breath is what governs the nature.
When a woman bears seldom her children live, and when she bears often her children die. Why is this? Because when births are far apart the breath is thick and the child is firm and strong, and when they are frequent the breath is thin and the child is soft. When a woman is carrying a child and the child born before it has died, people say the one she carries will not live. They give it the name "the carried one," and their meaning is that because the child already born has died, the child that was moved and hurt has lost its nature. But a born child dying and a carried child coming to ill is because bearing and suckling followed too close upon one another, and the breath was thin and could not complete them. Even when such a one completes a human body, it is easily moved and hurt. It alone falls sick first, and being sick it alone is not cured.
百歲之命，是其正也。不能滿百者，雖非正，猶為命也。譬猶人形一丈，正形也。名男子為丈夫，尊公嫗為丈人。不滿丈者，失其正也。雖失其正，猶乃為形也。夫形不可以不滿丈之故謂之非形，猶命不可以不滿百之故謂之非命也。非天有長短之命，而人各有稟受也。由此言之，人受氣命於天，卒與不卒，同也。語曰：「圖王不成，其弊可以霸。」霸者，王之弊也。霸本當至於王，猶壽當至於百也。不能成王，退而為霸。不能至百，消而為夭。王霸同一業，優劣異名。壽夭或一氣，長短殊數。何以知不滿百為夭者？百歲之命也，以其形體小大長短同一等也。百歲之身，五十之體，無以異也。身體不異，血氣不殊。鳥獸與人異形，故其年壽與人殊數。
A destiny of a hundred years is the correct one. One that cannot fill out a hundred, though it is not the correct one, is still a destiny. It is like a man's body being one zhang, which is the correct body. A male is named zhangfu, and an elder is honored as zhangren. One who does not fill out a zhang has lost the correct measure, but though he has lost the correct measure he is still a body. Just as a body cannot be called no body because it does not fill out a zhang, so a destiny cannot be called no destiny because it does not fill out a hundred. It is not that Heaven has long and short destinies, but that each man has what he received. Speaking from this, in receiving breath and destiny from Heaven, finishing and not finishing are one and the same.
A saying has it, "He who plans to be a king and does not succeed may with what is left of it become a hegemon." The hegemon is what is left of a king. A hegemon ought properly to have reached kingship, just as a lifespan ought properly to reach a hundred. Not able to complete kingship, a man draws back and becomes a hegemon. Not reaching a hundred, a life dwindles and becomes an early death. King and hegemon are one and the same work, and better and worse give them different names. Long life and early death are one and the same breath, and long and short give them different numbers.
How is it known that not filling out a hundred is dying early? Because a hundred years is the destiny, and because the size and the length of men's bodies are all of one grade. The body of a man of a hundred and the body of a man of fifty are not different. The bodies not being different, the blood and the breath are not different either. Birds and beasts have bodies different from men's, and so their years and their lifespans have a different number from men's.
何以明人年以百為壽也？世間有矣。儒者說曰：太平之時，人民侗長百歲左右，氣和之所生也。《堯典》曰：「朕在位七十載，求禪得舜。」舜征三十歲在位。堯退而老，八歲而終，至殂落九十八歲。未在位之時，必已成人，今計數百有餘矣。又曰：「舜生三十，征用三十，在位五十載，陟方乃死。」適百歲矣。
How is it made clear that a man's years take a hundred as their span? Because such men exist in the world. The scholars say that in a time of great peace the people grow tall and live about a hundred years, and that this is born of the evenness of the breath.
The Canon of Yao says, "I have been on the throne seventy years, and seeking one to yield it to I found Shun." Shun came to the throne thirty years after he was summoned. Yao withdrew and grew old and finished eight years later, so that at his death he was ninety-eight. Before he was on the throne he must already have been a grown man, so that counting it now it comes to more than a hundred. It also says, "Shun had lived thirty years before he was summoned, was called and used for thirty, and was fifty years on the throne; then he went on progress through the four quarters and died." That is exactly a hundred years.
文王謂武王曰：「我百，爾九十。吾與爾三焉。」文王九十七而薨，武王九十三而崩。周公，武王之弟也，兄弟相差不過十年。武王崩，周公居攝七年，復政退老，出入百歲矣。邵公，周公之兄也，至康王之時，尚為太保，出入百有余歲矣。聖人稟和氣，故年命得正數。氣和為治平，故太平之世多長壽人。百歲之壽，蓋人年之正數也，猶物至秋而死，物命之正期也。物先秋後秋，則亦如人死或增百歲或減百也。先秋後秋為期，增百減百為數。物或出地而死，猶人始生而夭也。物或逾秋不死，亦如人年多度百至於三百也。傳稱老子二百余歲，邵公百八十，高宗享國百年，周穆王享國百年。并未享國之時，皆出百三十、四十歲矣。
King Wen said to King Wu, "I am a hundred and you are ninety. I give you three of mine." King Wen died at ninety-seven and King Wu died at ninety-three. The Duke of Zhou was King Wu's younger brother, and an elder and a younger brother do not differ by more than ten years. King Wu died, and the Duke of Zhou acted as regent for seven years and then gave back the government and withdrew in old age, so that he was about a hundred. Duke Shao was the Duke of Zhou's elder brother, and down to the time of King Kang he was still Grand Protector, so that he too was something over a hundred.
The sage receives the even breath, and so his years and his destiny get the correct number. When the breath is even the rule is peaceful, and so in an age of great peace there are many long-lived men. A lifespan of a hundred years is the correct number of a man's years, just as a plant dying when autumn comes is the correct term of a plant's destiny.
That a plant comes before autumn or after it is like a man in dying passing a hundred or falling short of a hundred. Coming before autumn or after it is a matter of time, and passing a hundred or falling short of it is a matter of number. A plant that comes out of the ground and dies at once is like a man who dies early as soon as he is born, and a plant that passes autumn and does not die is like a man whose years go far past a hundred and reach three hundred.
It is handed down that Laozi lived more than two hundred years and Duke Shao a hundred and eighty, and that Gaozong held the state a hundred years and King Mu of Zhou also held the state a hundred years. Counting in the time before they held the state, all of them pass a hundred and thirty or a hundred and forty years.