Original source spelling · punctuation belongs to the digital witness · pronunciation tools follow your language focus.
人何以能群？曰：分。分何以能行？曰：義。
How can people form a community? Through distinctions. How can those distinctions operate? Through what is right.
zimai · AI-assisted editorial notes · Editorial pilot · not independently reviewed · CC BY-SA 4.0A route through this passage
38 Han characters · 20 distinct forms · 13 units separated by the witness’s punctuation
- Establish the frame. Read the surrounding chapter. Who speaks, what is being discussed, and which earlier words supply the context?
- Test one unit.
力不若牛，
Mark a possible predicate and its participants. Record what you have supplied rather than found explicitly in the text. - Reconstruct the argument. Connect the units in your own words. Where does a description, question, contrast, or consequence depend on your interpretation?
Investigate 7 written forms in this passage
Matched by spelling. These are candidate reading procedures, not assigned grammatical analyses.
Watch recurrence: 能 × 4 不 × 3 何 × 3 曰 × 3 群 × 3 若 × 2. Repetition of a graph need not mean repetition of a sense.
Computed from this exact witness · 1 contextual editorial excerpt also available. The guide is a set of reading prompts, not a translation. Sources & methods
Make this passage yours.
Use the reading guide above, build your interpretation, then test what you can recover. Your notes and schedule stay on this device.
1 · Explain it in your own words
2 · Recover the wording
Select a source unit, then hide the passage and reconstruct it. This checks textual recall, not understanding.
3 · Explain, then revisit
Which relation do the one-word answers complete?
Compare the editorial answer
The means or basis introduced by 何以.
zimai editorial draft · not independently reviewed. Applies to 人何以能群？曰：分。分何以能行？曰：義。
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Rate your understanding yourself. These reminders use a simple schedule; they do not certify mastery.
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Read this beside…
Each connection states its purpose. Comparisons are editorial learning aids; shared wording alone does not prove influence.
Argument contrastWhat makes collective action possible?Xunzi asks how differentiated roles permit people to form a group; Mencius ranks human accord above terrain. The comparison draws attention to social conditions while preserving their distinct questions and argumentative settings.
Shared constructionThe same question structure in prose and verseBoth excerpts place 何 before 以. One asks for the basis of social grouping, while the other asks how to endure material hardship. A grammatical connection can be precise even when the subject matter and genre differ greatly.
Follow a connection
Shared teaching construction · an editorial learning connection, not evidence of common authorship or origin.
論語 · Notice an object before its verb未之有也論語 · Recover what the text leaves unstated本立而道生論語 · Recover what the text leaves unstated吾日三省吾身論語 · Recover what the text leaves unstated行有餘力，則以學文Edition, source, and reuse
- Work
- 荀子 · Xunzi
- Attribution
- Traditionally associated with Xun Kuang; the received collection contains multiple textual layers.
- Digital witness
- Kanseki Repository · KR3a0002 · base edition tls
- Contributors
- Kanseki Repository (Kanripo) contributors; upstream base-edition labels retained in each original file.
- Source position
- KR3a0002_009.txt, lines 590–602. XUN 9:16a:2, Beida p.127; Knoblock 2:104
- Version
e18a27621ef434940a368defd29e00eee205dfd2- Reuse
- CC BY-SA 4.0. Text extraction and teaching additions share this licence.
- Text policy
- Source spelling and punctuation retained. Encoding headers, page markers, paragraph markers, whitespace, and leading section numbers are removed from the reading view. No silent script conversion or textual correction.
- Teaching
- zimai · AI-assisted editorial notes. English renderings are excerpt-level reading aids, not a full published translation. Editorial pilot · not independently reviewed.
Source-file SHA-256: ce05b562ee856e53c19c35a79e35ab9e4dda60fd35290e38a80c439e90550a30. A source comment that cites a translator is an upstream reference, not the attribution of a translation imported here.