Yes, I agree that it can - very much so. I find a peaceful kind of pleasure in the beauty of nature, but also in beautiful craftsmanship, such as in hand-loomed Persian rugs, Japanese ceramics, the sound of a string orchestra, the savory smells of good cooking, or the exquisite wording in the works of the best writers. While too much chasing after beauty can lead to shallowness at the expense of more important values, once these basics are met, moderation in beauty can enhance life wonderfully.
By "too much" beauty, I was thinking of instances like the great pyramids, where hundreds of thousands of slaves suffered to create such extraordinary wonders, or the palaces like Versailles, where royalty and aristocracy led lives of extreme decadence and luxury while a majority of the common population lived with malnutrition, starvation and higher rates of disease and earlier deaths. Even today, in modern Western life, there are people willing to displace Amazon Indians and burn a patch of Brazilian rainforest to mine emeralds which have no use other than as jewellery.
I think that's probably or mostly true when there is the luxury of choice. But beauty can also run deep - for instance in the beauty of a generous and kind person, or a mind that thinks deeply.
It's true - but consider how ambiguous this famous old statement is.
If taken literally, it could mean the eye of the beholder is beautiful. It could mean that whatever the beholder happens to see is beautiful.
It could mean what we usually assume it to mean, that the idea and perception of beauty depends entirely on the taste, (sometimes needs) and values of the perceiver, and has no possibility of objective criteria.
There is an old Arabic saying; "He whom the heart loves best is ever the most beautiful." I think it's true. My husband would never make it to the cover of Vogue for Men, but to me, he is the most beautiful man on Earth.
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