Go to, let us make brick, let us build us a city — The country being a plain, yielded neither stone nor morter, yet that did not discourage them, but they made brick to serve instead of stone, and slime, or pitch, instead of morter.
Some think they intended hereby to secure themselves against the waters of another flood, but if they had, they would have chosen to build upon a mountain rather than upon a plain. But two things it seems they aimed at in building. To make them a name: they would do something to be talked of by posterity. But they could not gain this point; for we do not find in any history the name of so much as one of these Babel — builders. Philo Judeus saith they engraved every one his name upon a brick; yet neither did that serve their purpose. They did it to prevent their dispersion; lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the earth — It was done (saith Josephus) in disobedience to that command, Genesis 9:1, replenish the earth. God orders them to scatter. No, say they, we will live and die together. In order hereunto they engage themselves and one another in this vast undertaking. That they might unite in one glorious empire, they resolve to build this city and tower, to be the metropolis of their kingdom, and the center of their unity.