Here is the case of Heraclitus, who retreated to the open spaces and the colonnades of the vast temple of Artemis: this "desert" was certainly more worthy - I admit it!

Why shouldn't we also have such temples? (Hmm, perhaps we do have them. Right now, the most beautiful workspace I ever had comes to mind, in Piazza di San Marco, spring, ten to twelve in the morning…)

However, Heraclitus also avoided what we avoid today: the noise and the chatter of the Ephesians, their democracy, their political miseries, the latest achievements of the "empire" (the Persian - you know what I mean…), all the filthy wares of the "present", … because we philosophers need above all a certain quietness: we need rest from the "present".