Abstract
This paper insists that Wilhelm von Humboldt’s educational theory as a statesman had a folk
or nation-oriented character under the universe-oriented form.
In “Koenigsberg and Lithuania schoolplan” (1809), Humboldt suggested language study, especially ancient Greek and Latin, in secondary education. His official reason was that it was useful for universal self-cultivation.
The keyword to understand the core of his statement is “Weltansicht” (a folk’s own world) in his linguistics. According to Humboldt, each folk has each “Weltansicht”. Thought and language of each folk is under the influence of it. And “Weltansicht” gets much affluence when it faces another. The change for the better of it will continue endlessly. So this process may be called “the dialectical process”. A folk develops from its own state into higher stage in the process.
In the political context of Germany, this process meant that German would approach the universal state through ancient Greek and Latin and be the good nation.
