As much as The confessions of a beautiful soul constitute a text of a literary nature, it contains a philosophical interest, at least judging by the extension of the concept of "beautiful soul" in the philosophy of the eighteenth century, as found in Rousseau , Hegel, Schiller, among others. However, its origin dates back to Plato, and from this to Plotinus, from Plotinus to Saint Augustine and from here to the German mysticism of the late Middle Ages and Spanish religious literature of the 16th and 17th centuries.

But what is a "beautiful soul"? Regardless of the many nuances that the issue has, it is that which tends to good by itself, by nature and without apparent effort or contradiction with itself. It is a moral category, but that is expressed with aesthetic terminology: to unite the beautiful and the good, according to the old Greek ideal, overcoming the split between nature and freedom. From this point of view, it is interesting to note that "beautiful souls" are usually women, who reconcile inclination and duty, nature and freedom, but not for themselves, but specifically for the man who is reflected in them, and who writes «Beautiful» literary works. In addition to the obvious resonances that a feminist critique may have for this mystification of the feminine, the category of "beautiful soul" also allows us to understand some aesthetic keys of romanticism and classicism. And all this through the fine psychological look of Goethe.