The Analects opens with three short statements, and the first is about pleasure: to learn and at due times to practise what one has learned — is this not a delight. The second is about the joy of a friend coming from a distance, and the third about not being resentful when one is not recognised. It is a striking way to begin a work whose reputation is for austerity and obligation, and Chinese commentators have taken the placement to be deliberate. The tradition returns to the theme: Confucius describes himself as someone who forgets to eat in his enthusiasm and does not notice old age approaching; he says that one who knows a thing is not the equal of one who loves it, and one who loves it is not the equal of one who delights in it; he praises Yan Hui for a joy that poverty could not touch. The claim being made is substantial rather than decorative — that the cultivation being asked for is intrinsically rewarding, and that a person who finds it merely dutiful has not yet got hold of it.