忖 (cǔn): to ponder

Meanings

1 to ponder
2 to speculate; to guess
3 to weigh in one's mind

Characters

忖

cǔn

to ponder; to speculate

Examples

HSK 5

她仔细忖思了一下，终于答应了。

Tā zǐxì cǔn sī le yí xià, zhōngyú dāying le.

She thought it over carefully and finally agreed.

HSK 7-9

他暗自忖度对方的用意。

Tā ànzì cǔn duó duìfāng de yòngyì.

He silently weighed the other person's intentions.

Tips

usage

忖 is literary; in everyday speech use 猜 (to guess) or 考虑 (to consider). It most often appears in 忖度, to weigh and guess at someone's meaning.

memory

Heart on the left, 寸 (an inch) on the right: measuring something inch by inch inside your heart, exactly what 'to ponder, to weigh up' means.

Components

radical

忄 xīn

heart; mind

Left is the upright heart radical 忄, the side form of 心. It places the word among mental and emotional activity, here turning something over in the mind.

phonetic

寸 cùn

inch (phonetic, with measuring hint)

Right is 寸, an inch, giving the sound cǔn and a neat overtone of measuring. The heart that measures is a mind that weighs and estimates, the meaning of 忖.