Beauty...

But that the thing we are pursuing is something different and that the beauty
is not in the concrete object is manifest from the beauty there is in matters of
study, in conduct and custom; briefly, in soul or mind.

And it is precisely here
that the greater beauty lies, perceived whenever you look to the wisdom in a
man and delight in it, not wasting attention on the face, which may be hideous,
but passing all appearance by and catching only at the inner comeliness, the truly
personal;

if you are still unmoved and cannot acknowledge beauty under such
conditions, then looking to your own inner being you will find no beauty to
delight you and it will be futile in that state to seek the greater vision, for you will
be questing it through the ugly and impure.


Enneads, V.8.2
Plotinus