naturally signifies a habitation, and the building of the Tower of Babel to escape the waters of a flood is that reaction against the psychic element which denies spiritual things altogether and makes of the body and its physical environment the one and only dwelling-place of man. It is the same error as before of trying to erect the edifice of Wholeness on the foundation merely of a part, only now the part selected is the corporeal instead of the psychic. Arithmetically it is the attempt to make out that one-third is the same as ONE. The natural consequences soon follow in the confusion of tongues.

Language is the expression of Thought, and if our ideas of reality include nothing more than the infinitude of secondary causes which appear in the material world, there is no central Unit around which they can be grouped and consequently, instead of any certain knowledge, we have only a multitude of conflicting opinions based upon the ever-changing aspects of the world of appearances. Quot homines tot sententiae [there are as many opinions as there are persons --- Ed]; and so the builders are dispersed in confusion, for theirs is not "the city that hath foundations whose builder and maker is God" [Hebrews 11:10].

The Patriarchs

From this point in the Bible story, a stretch of many ages brings us to the times of the Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We are here in the transition stage from allegory to history, and St Paul points out this intermingling of the two elements when he tells us that