man”—the separate individuals equal before a written code of 
law. Separateness of the individual, continuity of space and of 
time, and uniformity of codes are the prime marks of literate 
and civilized societies. Tribal cultures like those of the Indian 
and the Chinese may be greatly superior to the Western 
cultures, in the range and delicacy of their perceptions and 
expression. However, we are not here concerned with the 
question of values, but with the configurations of societies. 
Tribal cultures cannot entertain the possibility of the individual 
or of the separate citizen. Their ideas of spaces and times are 
neither continuous nor uniform, but compassional and 
compressional in their intensity. It is in its power to extend 
patterns of visual uniformity and continuity that the 
“message” of the alphabet is felt by cultures.

     As an intensification and extension of the visual function,