A clerk hadde litherly biset his whyle,
But if he koude a carpenter bigyle.
– Geoffrey Chaucer
The Canterbury Tales, The Miller’s Tale. Smart-alecky Oxford scholar Nicholas believes that a clerk has badly wasted his time studying if he cannot outwit and trick a carpenter! He looks down his intellectual nose at carpenter landlord John, a caring, but not very bright member of the lower classes, as he plots an illicit affair with John’s wife.