Not utter’d by base sale of chapmen’s tongues”Įven Founding Father Benjamin Franklin paralleled the sentiment in Poor Richard’s Almanack, 1741, writing:Īnd, just a year later, David Hume penned: “Beauty is bought by judgement of the eye, “…as neere is Fancie to Beautie, as the pricke to the Rose, as the stalke to the rynde, as the earth to the roote.”Ī similar sentiment was eloquently expressed by Shakespeare in Love’s Labor Lost: One example is found in English playwright John Lyly’s late 16 th century play, Euphues and his England: On the side of beauty being a subjective matter, many expressed sentiments similar to Plato, and plenty of variations on his statement followed. Philosophers continued to grapple with the question of the question whether beauty was objective or subjective for centuries. So, a thing beautiful for one might not be beautiful for the other. According to Plato, the sense of beauty is itself transient in nature. The concept that each individual has a different inclination of what is beautiful first appeared in the 3rd century BC in Greek. What’s the origin of the phrase ‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder’? So what one person perceives as flawless and captivating might be ordinary or unappealing to another. ‘Beauty in the eye of the beholder’ has a literal meaning: that the perception of beauty is subjective – people can have differing opinions on what is beautiful. But where did the saying “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder” originate? It’s one of the most universally celebrated phrases about the nature of love and appreciation.

One of the most universally celebrated phrases about the nature of love and appreciation is “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder”. With Valentine’s Day coming up, we often turn our gaze to our loved ones.

Eye of the beholder quote