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.

Then comes the Epistle of James.  Will you see whether it is longer than any that come after it?  The boys, after a minute’s examination, answer, “Yes, sir;” “Yes, sir.”

“What comes next?”

“The epistles of Peter.”

“Yes; and you will see that the longest of Peter’s epistles is next in length to that of James’s; and, indeed, all his are arranged in the order of their length.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What comes next?”

“John’s.”

“Yes; and they are arranged in the order of their length.  Do you now understand the principle of the arrangement of the epistles?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I should like to have any of you who are interested in it to try to express this principle in a few sentences, on paper, and lay it on my desk to-morrow, and I will read what you write.  You will find it very difficult to express it.  Now you may lay aside your books.  It will be pleasanter for you if you do it silently.”

Intelligent children will be interested even in so simple a point as this—­much more interested than a maturer mind, unacquainted with the peculiarities of children, would suppose.  By bringing up from time to time some such literary inquiry as this, they will be led insensibly to regard the Bible as opening a field for interesting intellectual research, and will more easily be led to study it.