The beautiful soul is a central motif in European literature in the second half of the 18th century. On one hand, the beautiful soul serves society as a medium for self-description. It outlines the ideal of autonomy, where individual conscience and normative taste are harmoniously balanced as good and beautiful forms without rules. On the other hand, the concept of the beautiful soul is based on a way of thinking that addresses both the differences between conscience and taste and the fractures within constructions of conscience. The idea of the beautiful soul does not simply demand the long-problematic unity or reliable beautiful morality; rather, its very emergence carries the form of its own critique and transformation. Marie Wokalek elucidates this phenomenon and describes it using exemplary texts from Rousseau and Wieland.