The boys answer promptly, "Revelations."
"Do you know what books are between the Acts and the book of Revelation?"
Some say "No, sir;" some begin to enumerate such books as occur to them, and some, perhaps, begin to name them promptly and in their regular order.
"I do not mean," interrupts the teacher, "the names of the books, but the kinds of books."
The boys hesitate.
"They are epistles or letters. Do you know who wrote the letters?"
"Paul," "Peter," answer many voices at once.
"Yes, there were several writers. Now the point which I wish to bring before you is this; do you know in what order, I mean on what principles, the books are arranged?"
"No, sir," is the universal reply.
I will tell you. First come all Paul's epistles. If you turn over the leaves of the Testament, you will see that Paul's letters are all put together after the book of the Acts; and what I wish you to notice is, that they are arranged in the order of their length. The longest comes first, and then the next, and so on to the shortest, which is the epistle to Philemon. This, of course, comes last—no, I am wrong in saying it is the last of Paul's epistles; there is one more to the Hebrews; and this comes after all the others, for there has been a good deal of dispute whether it was really written by Paul. You will see that his name is not at the beginning of it, as it is in his other epistles: so it was put last.