Why do humans congregate in big cities?
Gene Logsdon, The Contrary Farmer, Mulligan Books

One of life’s mysteries for me is why country people have inevitably migrated to the cities in every civilization that I have studied. In the United States, where there has been little of the kind of violent upheavals that send third world countries into instability, the reasons for migration to cities seem especially specious to me.

I remember Dr. Marshner proclaiming his love of the city once during class. Mr. Logsdon writes:

Sometimes I think the ideal life occurred in Europe (probably other places too) before the two world wars wrecked the old agrarian life there. Unlike in America, where farmers established themselves on homesteads dotted out all over the countryside some distance from each other, European farmers preferred to live in villages, and to go out daily to their farms around the village. There was little chance to feel isolated or bored and lonely because in the evenings they all gathered on doorsteps or street corners or more likely in the taverns, and enjoyed the camaraderie, true social security, pastimes and amusements of communal life.

A group of families living together can advance in their cultivation of the virtues and arts, and there is the aspect of leisure and communal festivity that Mr. Logsdon alludes to, as well as just plain living together. (Dr. Marshner, on the other hand, seemed to be referring to the presence of "culture," concerts and such.) This is different from the phenomenon of mass urbanization today, in which people abandon farming in search of a better living.

mass urbanization and the new Metropolis