And the world being thus created according to the eternal pattern is the
copy of something; and we may assume that words are akin to the matter of
which they speak. What is spoken of the unchanging or intelligible must be
certain and true; but what is spoken of the created image can only be
probable; being is to becoming what truth is to belief. And amid the
variety of opinions which have arisen about God and the nature of the world
we must be content to take probability for our rule, considering that I,
who am the speaker, and you, who are the judges, are only men; to
probability we may attain but no further.

SOCRATES: Excellent, Timaeus, I like your manner of approaching the
subject--proceed.

TIMAEUS: Why did the Creator make the world?...He was good, and therefore
not jealous, and being free from jealousy he desired that all things should
be like himself. Wherefore he set in order the visible world, which he
found in disorder. Now he who is the best could only create the fairest;
and reflecting that of visible things the intelligent is superior to the
unintelligent, he put intelligence in soul and soul in body, and framed the
universe to be the best and fairest work in the order of nature, and the
world became a living soul through the providence of God.

In the likeness of what animal was the world made?--that is the third
question...The form of the perfect animal was a whole, and contained all
intelligible beings, and the visible animal, made after the pattern of
this, included all visible creatures.

Are there many worlds or one only?--that is the fourth question...One only.
For if in the original there had been more than one they would have been
the parts of a third, which would have been the true pattern of the world;