Symbolism of the wild.

(2) And to those who raise the question why the lawgiver gave his laws not in cities but in the deep desert, we must say, in the first place, that the generality of cities are full of unspeakable evils, and of acts of audacious impiety towards the Deity, and of injustice on the part of the citizens to one another; (3) for there is nothing which is wholly free from alloy, what is spurious getting the better of what is genuine, and what is plausible of what is true; which things in their nature are false, but which suggest plausible imaginations to the engendering of deceit in cities; (4) from whence also that most designing of all things, namely pride, is implanted, which some persons admire and worship, dignifying and making much of vain opinions, with golden crowns and purple robes, and numbers of servants and chariots, on which those men who are looked upon as fortunate and happy are borne aloft, sometimes harnessing mules or horses to their chariots, and sometimes even men, who bear their burdens on their necks, through the excess of the insolence of their masters, weighed down in soul even before they faint in body.

We read this passage today in class and did a little bit of discussion, and it reminded me of a story I read in the 11th grade. I tried for a while to find it, and finally discovered what I was looking for: Nathaniel Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown. (Great read. I 100% suggest it.) 

So What I get out of this passage from Philo is that the city is a headquarter of sin. It is where the wicked reside. However, In Young Goodman Brown, it brings up a different opinion. It says, 

"With this excellent resolve for the future, Goodman Brown felt himself justified in making more haste on his present evil purpose. He had taken a dreary road, darkened by all the gloomiest trees of the forest, which barely stood aside to let the narrow path creep through, and closed immediately behind. It was all as lonely as could be; and there is this peculiarity in such a solitude, that the traveler knows not who may be concealed by the innumerable trunks and the thick boughs overhead; so that, with lonely footsteps, he may yet be passing through an unseen multitude.

"There may be a devilish Indian behind every tree," said Goodman Brown to himself; and he glanced fearfully behind him, as he added, "What if the devil himself should be at my very elbow!"

His head being turned back, he passed a crook of the road, and looking forward again, beheld the figure of a man, in grave and decent attire, seated at the foot of an old tree. He arose, at Goodman Brown's approach, and walked onward, side by side with him."

In this story, it seems that the safe haven is in the city. This is where security lies. This is where community lies. However, the wilderness of the forest is where evil lies. The forest is the hiding place for evil because it conceals sin. Goodman Brown wants to go into the forest because the forest is open to sin. He is wanting to sin and the wilderness hides his actions. Once there, he meets a man who is truly the Devil, and later everyone in the community who also is going to the woods for evil, and those in the community who were pious turned out to be witches and wizards who wanted to sin rather to speak the name of God. 

Where I'm going with this blog is that these two have contrasting views of the wilderness. Philo's wilderness is a safe haven from the wickedness of the city, but  Hawthorne's wilderness is a place to act in wickedness to leave from the safe haven of the city.