The women are handsome, yet do not stand in need of beauty, since they possess all those qualifications which enhance its value and even supply the want of it.
 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Confessions (1782). copy citation

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Author Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Source Confessions
Topic beauty qualification
Date 1782
Language English
Reference
Note Translated by Samuel William Orson
Weblink https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Confessions_(Rousseau)

Context

“they cannot give way to ambition, but follow, through necessity, the counsel of Cyneas, devoting their youth to a military employment, and returning home to grow old in peace; an arrangement over which honor and reason equally preside. The women are handsome, yet do not stand in need of beauty, since they possess all those qualifications which enhance its value and even supply the want of it. It is remarkable, that being obliged by my profession to see a number of young girls, I do not recollect one at Chambery but what was charming: it will be said I was disposed to find them so, and perhaps there maybe some truth in the surmise.” source