Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805), German poet, dramatist, philosopher and publisher, was a prominent contributor to the educational neo-humanistic concept of Bildung at the threshold to Romanticism. Schiller assigns a pivotal role to the aesthetic education arguing that aesthetic activity reconciles sensuousness and reason and thereby creates the precondition of knowledge and morality. The article examines elitist and sexist traits in Schiller's work and whether they are constitutive to his theory of aesthetics and education. By identifying problems in the philosophical foundations of the concept of Bildung the authors wish to contribute to its ongoing reconstruction in the Nordic Countries.