135. ABHINAVAGUPTA'S THEORY OF ÆSTHETICS 155

ABHINAVAGUPTA'S THEORY OF ÆSTHETICS 155

of beautiful sights and sounds. This attitude is respon- sible for the percipient's self-forgetfulness as soon as the music starts. All ideas, therefore, connected with worldly life are inhibited. The introductory scene further deter- mines his attitude. The determination consists in (I) the supervention of the basic mental attitude, with which he is to face the entire presentation (II) tendency to identify with the focus of the situation and to perceive the presented through the eyes and ears of the latter. Thus, when the presentation of the plot begins, the elements of time and place, the idea of reality or unreality of the presented, and all those mental processes, which are in- volved in the rise of consciousness of right, wrong, dubious and possible, are inhibited from the intellectual apprehension of the presented.1

II. FROM SENSE-LEVEL TO SELF-FORGETFULNESS. With an attitude of play the æsthete reaches the theatre. But still the ideas, connected with the world, haunt him to some extent. As he sits down, looking on the outer side of the stage or something else and expecting the commencement of the drama, music starts. His attention is fixed and other ideas automatically tend to disappear. Soon after the music the stage-manager comes with his wife and attendants and announces the play that is going to be staged, introduces song, dance and music so as to bring about a state of self-forgetfulness in the audience and retires announcing the arrival of the hero or some other character. That the music in the introductory scene in a drama, transports the audience from the ordinary world to that of the art, is the opinion of no less an. authority than Kalidasa, who puts the following statement 1. A. Bh. Vol. I., pp. 36-37.