And therefore education at the University mostly worked by the age-old method of putting a lot of young people in the vicinity of a lot of books and hoping that something would pass from one to the other, while the actual young people put themselves in the vicinity of inns and taverns for exactly the same reason.

Summary

This quote humorously captures the traditional approach to education at universities. It suggests that the predominant method of learning relied on simply placing students in close proximity to books, hoping that knowledge would transfer. However, it also acknowledges the reality that many students would choose to spend their time in social settings, like inns and taverns, seeking similarity in their pursuit of knowledge. This quote emphasizes the passive nature of education at the time and satirizes the notion that intellectual growth can be achieved solely through physical proximity to resources.