This sentiment is romantic, but mostly false. Does Google intend to rank the highest quality content? I believe that is their intention. Does the best quality content always, naturally rank? No. No, it doesn't. If it did, Google wouldn't need to release algo updates.
What I will say, to your credit, is that quality, non-SEO'd content is at least future-proofed and likely well-positioned to enjoy the benefits of Google updates (not to say they'll crack page 1, but at least they don't have to worry about being de-indexed). But, while people are waiting for their content to rank by the grace of Google Engineers, their hosting bills will be rolling in and their morale will be dropping.
If your keyword is easy enough, then this idea can work, but the majority of keywords that people want to rank for will require some intervention and promotion to push it up the ranks. And I'm not saying this as a person trying to push my SEO services. I don't sell services (I may in the future, but I'm too busy working on my own stuff).