The metropolis appears to be the symbol and the most powerful expression of a culture turned away from the natural, the simple, and the naive; wild hedonism, nervous haste, and revolting degeneration accumulate into a greyish chaos in it, to the disgust of the virtuous. [The metropolis] corrupts the people that it deceitfully lures to itself; it unnerves them, and makes them weak, selfish, and wicked.