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人心隔肚皮

Mandarin · pinyin rén xīn gé dù pí

there is no knowing what is in a man's heart (idiom)

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Characters in this entry

人: rén · man; people; mankind; someone else
心: xīn · heart; mind, intelligence; soul; 5th lunar mansion, determinative star α Scorpii (Antares)
隔: gé · separate, partition
肚: dù · belly; abdomen; bowels
皮: pí · skin, hide, fur, feather; outer

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

2–1–2–4–2 · ren2 xin1 ge2 du4 pi2

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

jan4 sam1 gaak3 tou5 pei4

Cantonese word readings for 人心隔肚皮. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

proverb

someone else's heart is difficult to know

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

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