dumb ox

While of the four, greatest of all, Albertus Magnus, the "Dumb Ox of Cologne," was born seven years before its opening, his life lasted over four-fifths of it; that of Aquinas covered its second and third quarters; Occam himself, though his main exertions lie beyond this century, was probably born before Aquinas died; while John Duns Scotus hardly outlived the century's close by a decade.

They are said to have called him the dumb one, or sometimes because of his bulkiness even as a youth, the dumb ox.

Thomas of Aquin, the great medieval writer on philosophy and theology, who still influences philosophy so much, was so slow as a young man that he was called by his fellow pupils "the dumb ox."

But I fear his development would rather have been in the direction of the “dumb ox” than towards the angels.

The boy himself believes that he is being sent to the priesthood to eke out the family income, and his fate, anticlerical O'Flaherty suggests, is little different from that of the dumb ox.