Alchemy

Alchemical practices, namely, attempts to attain immortality, are believed to have arisen in China in the fourth century B.C. in conjunction with spread of Taoism, a mystical spiritualist doctrine which emerged in reaction to the practical spirit of Confucianism, the dominant philosophy of the period. The main emphasis in Chinese alchemy, it seems, was not on transmutation—the changing of one metal into another—but on the search for human immortality. In their search for an elixir of immortality, court alchemists experimented with mercury, sulfur, and arsenic, often creating venomous potions; several emperors died after drinking them. Such spectacular failures eventually led to the disappearance of alchemy in China.