Vol. IX, No. 7.] Psychology of Indian Music. 303 
[V.S8.] 
selves, which is as exterior to the sound as acoustics, instead 
of measuring the intensive value of these sounds. This is the 
second psychological sin European musical theory nowadays 
commits. he Indian theory of tala emphasises just this 
intensive value of sounds, which the Europe of to-day ne- 
glects officially more than it ever did before. And what 
is the psychic meaning of intensity in music? Not only 
in music, but in all psychic life, it is changing intensity which 
produces a changing quality of sensations. Consult on the 
subject of this general psychological law the works of scientists 
of first rank, such as Exner, Sigwart and others; in exact 
science Europe is ahead of the rest of the world and it is this 
exact European science which provided me with the means of 
proving the high, the incomparable inner value of Eastern 
music. Musically speaking, it is the intensity of each sound 
which is the ‘‘raison d’etre’’, the mother (so to speak) of 
each sound. And changing intensity is the reason of chang- 
ing pitch of sounds. There is psychologically no feeling in 
= 
comes to the same thing.”’ 
Here you have the psychological reason of the ‘‘tala.’’ 
Tala is a means of causing each sound, which is, as we have 
seen, originated by the free will of the musician, to satisfy by 
changing degrees of intensity all the demands of his musical 
soul and to enter the musical soul of the listener. It is 
true that the Indian tala is in so far related to European 
barred measure, as the series of rhythms which the “ tala’’ 
produce themselves; and this is a point which will have to be 
revised by new India. In any case, even in its present condi- 
tion the tala is much more expressive than the accents of the 
European barred measure, which so to speak have ceased to 
exist in European artistic music and consequently do not 
contribute much to the inner life of the sounds. The tala is 
much longer and much richer in shadings 
x 
most advanced Europeans agree upon the artistic superiority 
r of Tar 
your memory, and a certain lishman, named 
Jones (Sir William Jones), the founder of the spre 
of Bengal, himself said in a speech before this Society : 
