A, mastering the fire Chinese medicine has a “martial fire” (large fire), “Wenhuo” (small fire), which is very scientific, generally first boiled on high heat, and then changed to low heat, so as to avoid the overflow of the juice and too quickly boiled dry. For light-textured drugs that are easy to disperse and volatile, such as flowers, stems and leaves, decoct on high heat, and then change to low heat for 10 minutes after boiling. For heavy-textured, sinking, tonic medicines, such as roots, blocks, minerals, etc., decoction on high heat and then slow decoction on low heat for about 50 minutes so that the active ingredients are fully dissolved in the liquid. Certain herbs can only be reduced or relieved of their toxicity by slow decoction over low heat, such as aconite and vicious poison. While decoction of antiphlogistic, antipyretic and aromatic herbs should be made with high fire and fast decoction, otherwise, it will cause excessive loss of active ingredients or change their medicinal properties. In addition, specific prescriptions will see first decoction, after decoction, packet decoction, melting, another decoction, soaking, punching, etc. These special requirements have been explained earlier. Second, the container soaking is appropriate to use casserole, tile or enamel jars, avoid using iron, copper and other metal pots and pans. First soak in cold water to soften the drug, the active ingredient is easy to penetrate into the water, add water more than two horizontal fingers of the drug surface. Soaking time, flowers, leaves, stems-based drugs about 20 minutes; roots, seeds, fruits-based drugs about 30 minutes; animal-based drugs can be as long as 60 minutes. External exorcism drugs should be soaked for a short time, while internal injury tonic drugs should be soaked for a long time. First of all, the decoction should be removed from the fire for 3 minutes and then strained. Do not wait for the liquid to cool down and then take the juice, because the active ingredients of some drugs become large particles after cooling and can be easily precipitated and discarded. Straining the medicine must be done with a gauze mesh to remove impurities from the juice, especially for drugs with lint, which can easily irritate the patient’s throat and cause coughing and nausea, it is beneficial to strain the medicine through gauze.