barren plants

Love’s Labor’s Lost, [4.2.24-33]. Nathaniel. “Sir, he hath never fed of the dainties that are bred in a book;/ He hath not eat paper, as it were; he hath not drunk/ ink. His intellect is not replenished; he is only an ani-/mal only sensible in the duller parts;/ And such barren plants are set before us, that we thankful should be,/ Which we of taste and feeling are, for those parts that do fructify in us more than he./ For as it would ill become me to be vain, indiscreet, or a fool,/ So were there a patch set on learning, to see him in a school./ But omne bene, say I, being of an old father’s mind;/ Many can brook the weather thaht love not the wind.”