break tribal unity, as the Old Testament declares (“And Satan 
rose up against Israel, and moved David to number Israel”). 
Phonetic letters and numbers were the first means of 
fragmenting and detribalizing man.

     Throughout Western history we have traditionally and 
rightly regarded letters as the source of civilization, and looked 
to our literatures as the hallmark of civilized attainment. Yet all 
along, there has been with us a shadow of number, the 
language of science. In isolation, number is as mysterious as 
writing. Seen as an extension of our physical bodies, it becomes 
quite intelligible. Just as writing is an extension and separation 
of our most neutral and objective sense, the sense of sight, 
number is an extension and separation of our most intimate 
and interrelating activity, our sense of touch.