20]

But here a very singular coincidence may be noticed, or, rather, is
forced upon our notice by the pyramidalists, who strangely enough
recognise in it fresh evidence of design, while the unbeliever finds in
it proof that coincidences are no sure evidence of design. The side of
the pyramid containing 365-1/4 times the sacred cubit of 25 pyramid
inches, it follows that the diagonal of the base contains 12,912 such
inches, and the two diagonals together contain 25,824 pyramid inches, or
almost exactly as many inches as there are years in the great
precessional period. 'No one whatever amongst men,' says Professor Smyth
after recording various estimates of the precessional period, 'from his
own or school knowledge, knew anything about such a phenomenon, until
Hipparchus, some 1900 years after the great pyramid's foundation, had a
glimpse of the fact; and yet it had been ruling the heavens for ages,
and was recorded in Jeezeh's ancient structure.' To minds not moved to
most energetic forgetfulness by the spirit of faith, it would appear
that when a square base had been decided upon, and its dimensions fixed,
with reference to the earth's diameter and the year, the diagonals of
the square base were determined also; and, if it so chanced that they
corresponded with some other perfectly independent relation, the fact
was not to be credited to the architects. Moreover it is manifest that
the closeness of such a coincidence suggests grave doubts how far other
coincidences can be relied upon as evidence of design. It seems, for
instance, altogether likely that the architects of the pyramid took the
sacred cubit equal to one 20,000,000th part of the earth's diameter for
their chief unit of length, and intentionally assigned to the side of
the pyramid's square base a length of just so many cubits as there are
days in the year; and the closeness of the coincidence between the
measured length and that indicated by this theory strengthens the idea
that this was the builder's purpose. But when we find that an even
closer coincidence immediately presents itself, which manifestly is a
coincidence _only_, the force of the evidence before derived from mere
coincidence is _pro tanto_ shaken. For consider what this new
coincidence really means. Its nature may be thus indicated: Take the
number of days in the year, multiply that number by 50, and increase the
result in the same degree that the diagonal of a square exceeds the
side--then th