Remarks
by Bill Nye

Presented by
Authorama
Public Domain Books

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This book is not designed specially for any one class of people. It is for all. It is a universal repository of thought. Some of my best thoughts are contained in this book. Whenever I would think a thought that I thought had better remain unthought, I would omit it from this book. For that reason the book is not so large as I had intended. When a man coldly and dispassionately goes at it to eradicate from his work all that may not come up to his standard of merit, he can make a large volume shrink till it is no thicker than the bank book of an outspoken clergyman.

This is the fourth book that I have published in response to the clamorous appeals of the public. Whenever the public got to clamoring too loudly for a new book from me and it got so noisy that I could not ignore it any more, I would issue another volume. The first was a red book, succeeded by a dark blue volume, after which I published a green book, all of which were kindly received by the American people, and, under the present yielding system of international copyright, greedily snapped up by some of the tottering dynasties.

But I had long hoped to publish a larger, better and, if possible, a redder book than the first; one that would contain my better thoughts, thoughts that I had thought when I was feeling well; thoughts that I had emitted while my thinker was rearing up on its hind feet, if I may be allowed that term; thoughts that sprang forth with a wild whoop and demanded recognition.

This book is the result of that hope and that wish. It is my greatest and best book. It is the one that will live for weeks after other books have passed away. Even to those who cannot read, it will come like a benison when there is no benison in the house. To the ignorant, the pictures will be pleasing. The wise will revel in its wisdom, and the housekeeper will find that with it she may easily emphasize a statement or kill a cockroach.

The range of subjects treated in this book is wonderful, even to me. It is a library of universal knowledge, and the facts contained in it are different from any other facts now in use. I have carefully guarded, all the way through, against using hackneyed and moth-eaten facts. As a result, I am able to come before the people with a set of new and attractive statements, so fresh and so crisp that an unkind word would wither them in a moment.

I believe there is nothing more to add, except that I most heartily endorse the book. It has been carefully read over by the proof-reader and myself, so we do not ask the public to do anything that we were not willing to do ourselves.

I cannot be responsible for the board of orphans whose parents read this book and leave their children in destitute circumstances.

Bill Nye

Continue...

Preface • Directions • My School Days • Recollections of Noah Webster • To Her Majesty • Habits of a Literary Man • A Father’s Letter • Archimedes • Anatomy • Mr. Sweeney’s Cat • The Heyday of Life • They Fell • Second Letter to the President • Milling in Pompeii • Broncho Sam • How Evolution Evolves • Hours With Great Men • Concerning Coroners • Down East Rum • Railway Etiquette • B. Franklin, Deceased • Life Insurance as a Health Restorer • The Opium Habit • More Paternal Correspondence • Twombley’s Tale • On Cyclones • The Arabian Language • Verona • A Great Upheaval • The Weeping Woman • The Crops • Literary Freaks • A Father’s Advice to His Son • Eccentricity in Lunch • Insomnia in Domestic Animals • Along Lake Superior • I Tried Milling • Our Forefathers • Preventing a Scandal • About Portraits • The Old South • Knights of the Pen • The Wild Cow • Spinal Meningitis • Skimming the Milky Way • A Thrilling Experience • Catching a Buffalo • John Adams • Bunker Hill • A Lumber Camp • My Lecture Abroad • The Miner at Home • An Operatic Entertainment • Dogs and Dog Days • Christopher Columbus • Accepting the Laramie Postoffice • A Journalistic Tenderfoot • The Amateur Carpenter • The Average Hen • Woodtick William’s Story • In Washington • My Experience as an Agriculturist • A New Autograph Album • A Resign • My Mine • Mush and Melody • The Blase Young Man • History of Babylon • Lovely Horrors • The Bite of a Mad Dog • Arnold Winkelreid • Murray and the Mormons • About Geology • A Wallula Night • Flying Machines • Asking for a Pass • Words About Washington • The Board of Trade • Stirring Incidents at a Fire • The Little Barefoot Boy • Favored a Higher Fine • Man Overbored • Picnic Incidents • Nero • Squaw Jim • Squaw Jim’s Religion • One Kind of Fool • John Adams’ Diary • The Approaching Humorist • What We Eat • Care of House Plants • A Peaceable Man

Remarksby Bill Nye

Remarks
by Bill Nye