Natural self-purification, a potential mechanism in nature whereby mankind and the Earth are interrelated with each other, has been playing an increasingly important role in the field of harnessing contamination and remedying environment. Neverthelsss, the self-purification of natural minerals widely occurring in the inorganic world has been largely ignored. This means that only half of the potential self-purification capabilities offered by nature are recognized, exploited and utilized. Utilizing most of the natural self-purification functions of both the organic and the inorganic world is a reflection of implementation of the whole self-purification function. Pollutant treatment by natural minerals is based on the law of nature and reflects natural self-purification function in the inorganic world, similar to that of the organic world. The purification function of natural minerals for reducing pollutants is reflected mainly in the basic properties of environmental mineral materials. The basic properties of this function include surface adsorption, modified porous filtration, defects of crystal structure, ionic exchange, chemical activation, physical effect and micro-effect at nanometre levels as well as mineralogical-biological interactions. A series of case studies related to the natural self-purification, which were mostly completely by our group, are discussed in this paper. Mineralogical method and biological method are well matched in pollutants disposal and jointly constitute a natural system of self-purification in terms of pollution treatment and environmental remediation in the spheres of interaction between mankind and the earth surface.