49. 52 CHAPTER 1

52 CHAPTER 1

oscillation of mind between two images; on the contrary, there is fusion of them, it cannot be said to be doubtful.

IT IS NOT A COGNITION OF SIMILARITY.

In the cognition of similarity there are two distinct images in the mind of beholder, one that serves as standard of comparison and the other, which stands as subject of comparison. As in the case of recognitive æsthetic appre- hension, the two images do not stand apart from each other, but fuse together as substance and its quality, it cannot be spoken of as cognition of similarity.

INFLUENCE OF PAINTING ON HIS ÆSTHETIC THEORY. It appears that at the time when Śri Sankuka wrote his commentary on the Natya Sastra of Bharata, there was a recognised view of experience, got from painting. For, he cites the analogy of experience, arising from a horse, painted by an expert artist, to explain the nature of æsthetic experience from dramatic presentation. And only a well known fact is cited as analogy. The analogy of painted horse implies that the æsthetic cognition is unique in itself and, therefore, is different from every accepted type of cognition in the system of Nyaya, which presents common sense point of view; that it is a special type of recognition, which cannot be classed as true, false or dubious; that it is not a mere consciousness of similarity of the artistically presented with something that is already well known, but fusion of the image, already in the mind, with the one that is generated by artistic object and that such a recognition yields artistic satisfaction. Srī Sankuka, therefore, holds that æsthetic recognition is an unanalysed flood of cog- nitions of the opposing nature and, therefore, no question about its nature can be raised. It is a unique experience. The consciousness of the imitated arises from an imitative