The construction of world-class university in China has made remarkable achievements, but the difficulties and long-term nature are still there, and a long time work is still needed. To realize the target of higher education power, the State Council promulgated the "Overall Scheme to Push Forward World First-class University and the First-class Discipline Construction" in 2015, to recognize the current practical problems of the construction of key universities and key disciplines and come up with higher and more pressing requirements and new construction thinking of world-class university construction. Today, utilitarian tendencies and cutthroat competition have emerged in world-class university construction in China, and a spiritual guidance to change the unreasonable situation is badly in need. The spirit of craftsman and the construction of world-class university have internal logic. The spiritual core of "rigorous focus" and "perseverance", the behavior objectives of "excelsior" and "pursuit of excellence", the behavior way of "realistic innovation" and "forging ahead with determination", the learning form of "respecting teachers and valuing education" and "imparting knowledge and clearing up confusion", are highly consistent with the construction path and value pursuit of world-class university in the new era. Based on this, by integrating the spirit of craftsman into the construction of world-class university, to reconstruct construction goal with "pursuit of excellence", to promote the continuous innovation of discipline construction pattern with "realistic innovation" and "forging ahead with determination", to promote the continuous improvement of evaluation system with "excelsior", and to reshape the basic mission of universities with "respecting teachers and valuing education" and "imparting knowledge and clearing up confusion", the construction path of world-class university can be promoted and optimized, and the construction of world-class university can be comprehensively promoted.