133. ABHINAVAGUPTA'S THEORY OF ÆSTHETICS 153

ABHINAVAGUPTA'S THEORY OF ÆSTHETICS 153

experiences by one another, appears as something different from what each isolated experience is separately.

VI. PSYCHO-PHYSICAL CONDITION. Every experience presupposes a certain psycho-physical state. The charming music, which is ordinarily pleasant, is positively unpleasant when gloom sits on the heart. The sportive movements of a beautiful lady similarly do not give rise to that experience in an old man which they naturally arouse in a young man. Æsthetic experience, therefore, because it is a result of contemplation and is consequent on identification with the focus of the presented eituation, requires the absence of all deep rooted ideas which the music may not be able to drive away, whether they be pleasant or unpleasant. A man, for instance, who has just lost a relative or is arm in arm with his beloved, cannot have æsthetic experience. Further, æsthetic experience of all types cannot be got at all times of life. Experience of perfect tranquillity (Santa) is not ordinarily possible in youth, nor that of the erotic (Srngara) in old age. Hence suitable psycho-physical conditions are also necessary for æsthetic experience.

VII. CAPACITY TO IDENTIFY. Identification consists in the unification of the self- forgetful self of the percipient with the human focus of the situation, which, being freed from the elements of time, place and all that constitutes individuality, is a mere set of certain psycho-physical conditions. We shall discuss this topic in detail in a subsequent section. We have presented above the two aspects, the objec- tive and the subjective, of æsthetic experience. We have now to show how these two aspects play their part in giving rise to æsthetic experience at the second level, which 20