perhaps this whole
subject will be more suitably discussed on some other occasion.

Time, then, and the heaven came into being at the same instant in
order that, having been created together, if ever there was to be a
dissolution of them, they might be dissolved together. It was framed
after the pattern of the eternal nature, that it might resemble this
as far as was possible; for the pattern exists from eternity, and the
created heaven has been, and is, and will be, in all time. Such was the
mind and thought of God in the creation of time. The sun and moon and
five other stars, which are called the planets, were created by him in
order to distinguish and preserve the numbers of time; and when he had
made their several bodies, he placed them in the orbits in which the
circle of the other was revolving,--in seven orbits seven stars. First,
there was the moon in the orbit nearest the earth, and next the sun,
in the second orbit above the earth; then came the morning star and the
star sacred to Hermes, moving in orbits which have an equal swiftness
with the sun, but in an opposite direction; and this is the reason why
the sun and Hermes and Lucifer overtake and are overtaken by each other.
To enumerate the places which he assigned to the other stars, and to
give all the reasons why he assigned them, although a secondary matter,
would give more trouble than the primary. These things at some future
time, when we are at leisure, may have the consideration which they
deserve, but not at present.

Now, when all the stars which were necessary to the creation of time
had attained a motion suitable to them, and had become living creatures
having bodies fastened by vital chains, and learnt their appointed
task, moving in the motion of the diverse, which is diagonal, and passes
through and is governed by the motion of the same, they revolved, some
in a larger and some in a lesser orbit--those which had the lesser orbit
revolving faster, and those which had the larger more slowly. Now by
reason of the motion of the same, those which revolved fastest appeared
to be overtaken by those which moved slower although they really
overtook them; for the motion of the same made them all turn in a
spiral, and, because some went one way and some another, that which
receded most slowly from the sphere of the same, which was the swiftest,
appeared to follow it most nearly. That there might be some visible
measure of their relative swiftness and s