On the subject of Beauty.

An Introduction

For any discussion of beauty it is of paramount importance that beauty be
defined. If not completely, atleast clearly enough to enable a person who
has never known anything beautiful to recognise instantly what I will
venture to describe. Finding such a person would be nigh impossible for
everyone has had some experience which have originated from or have given
rise to something beautiful.

What is beauty?

That brings us to the question, 'What is beauty?'
Different people have different criteria for 'measuring' beauty. Some even
go so far as to quantify it, something I shall try and avoid doing here. In
my opinion, quantifying beauty and quantifying poetry are analogous - both
actions being absolutely useless in that apart from being depressingly
esoteric, they provide no new knowledge or experience related to the
subjects.
The first observation I would like to make here is that beauty is a quality
or rather, a superposition or aggregate of many qualities. It cannot be
called a quantity or treated as one.

What are these qualities?

This leads to another obvious question. 'What are these qualities?' The
answer to this question is a large grey area; an area without definite
boundaries within and without.
The basic idea of what beauty is, varies from culture to culture, when the beauty refers to the beauty of a person (not an inanimate but beautiful scene or object). The Japanese idea of beauty differs from the Indian idea of beauty. And yet one finds that a person considered beautiful by one culture or people is considered beautiful by another culture or people as well. An obvious inference deduced from this is that culture influences the concept of beauty to a slight extent.
But we also find that different people of a same culture find different persons to be beautiful. So it would be wrong to assume that culture influences the concept of beauty to a very significant extent. Beauty is an individual judgement.
At the same time people from most cultures enjoy what is referred to as 'A beautiful sunset.'
Does this scene not have beauty? It does have beauty.So beauty is not necessarily
limited to living things. Beauty exists in situations and inanimate objects
as well as living beings like animals and humans.
The beauty found in inanimate objects transcends cultures. And although different cultures may have some quirky ideas about beautiful scenes/situations, these are in addition to the basic idea of a beautiful scene/situation which is common to all.

"Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder."

The only common factor between a beautiful sunset and a beautiful woman is
the observer who watches them both and makes value judgements based on his
own ideas. So it would not be entirely inaccurate to agree with the adage,
'Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder.' But accepting this gives rise to
a fact that may ultimately become detrimental to the purpose of this
write-up, which is to describe effectively what beauty is. Each person has a
basic idea of what is beautiful and what is not. These ideas are influenced
by many factors which I will consider later on. Now that we have established
that the idea of beauty actually differs from person to person (although the
amount by which it differs may itself vary), we shall proceed to analyse the
qualities which mark a beautiful person because a face has certain
characteristics which do not change in their basic nature (unlike a sunset
where the only certainity is the sun and the horizon).

A beautiful face

'What is the ideal definition of a beautiful face?'
The first thing I wish to do is to separate the concept of a beautiful face
from that of sex appeal. Sure, sex appeal may co-exist with beauty, but they
are not synonymous. I personally consider that beauty in humans stems from
elements of innocence still present in them inspite of their ages. I would
like to start by discussing what I personally find beautiful in people.
Although most qualities apply to women (because I observe them more), that
does not mean beauty is much different in men than in women - essentially,
it is the same thing, as opposed to sex appeal, which differs quite a lot
between the sexes.

Eyes.

I find some women have beautiful eyes. Now what does that mean? It means I
like the way their eyes look at the world. I like the way their eyes look at
other people. So what differentiates their eyes from eyes (of people) I don't find
beautiful? I believe the expression in the eyes plays a very important role here.
We may consider the eyes to have two facets - the physical inanimate
structure which includes colour, shape etc., and the way they look - a
quality. I will not bother much with the former facet because I have
observed that the colour/shape/physical characteristic of the eyes does not
matter to me. In my opinion, the latter facet plays the dominant role (or
maybe even the only role) in making a pair of eyes beautiful.
I shall venture into describing what expression I find common in 'beautiful'
eyes, although understanding such an expression whose description is being
made will require that you have observed it first hand.
The eyes are not dull or lacklustre. They are lively and shine in ambient
light. When you look at them, you only see them, and nothing else. They
divert you're attention away from the person, and yet you're still with that
person. The person may be unhappy, yet they radiate happiness. Or maybe it is
optimism. None the less, looking into such eyes is very pleasureable - you
feel an almost innocent pleasure when you look into beautiful eyes.

They eyes build up to the look on a person's face, and the look figures
prominently in the qualities essential for beauty. A woman would not look beautiful
with a look of helplessness on her face (although some people find this to be a major turn-on).
On the other hand, a look of confidence always contributes favourably towards making the person
beautiful. The look on a person's face corresponds to that person's attitude
and thought processes - in short, it represents the person's mind. And a
beautiful mind implies a beautiful face with a linear relation.