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Stroud makes Christ drink "the cup of the wrath of God." Jenkyn says, "he suffered as one disowned and reprobated and forsaken of God." Dwight considers that he endured God's "hatred and contempt." Bishop Jeune tells us that "after man had done his worst, worse remained for Christ to bear. He had fallen into his father's hands." Archbishop Thomson preaches that "the clouds of God's wrath gathered thick over the whole human race: they discharged themselves on Jesus only;" he "becomes a curse for us, and a vessel of wrath." Liddon echoes the same sentiment: "the apostles teach that mankind are slaves, and that Christ on the Cross is paying their ransom. Christ crucified is voluntarily devoted and accursed:" he even speaks of "the precise amount of ignominy and pain needed for the redemption," and says that the "divine victim" paid more than was absolutely necessary.

These quotations seem sufficient to prove that the Christians of the present day are worthy followers of the elder believers. The theologians first quoted are indeed coarser in their expressions, and are less afraid of speaking out exactly what they believe, but there is no real difference of creed between the awful doctrine of Flavel and the polished dogma of Canon Liddon. The older and the modern Christians alike believe in the bitter wrath of God against "the whole human race." Both alike regard the Atonement as so much pain tendered by Jesus to the Almighty Father in payment of a debt of pain owed to God by humanity. They alike represent God as only to be pacified by the sight of suffering. Man has insulted and injured God, and God must be revenged by inflicting suffering on the sinner in return. The "hatred and contempt" God launched at Jesus were due to the fact that Jesus was the sinner's substitute, and are therefore the feelings which animate the Divine heart towards the sinner himself. God hates and despises the world. He would have "consumed it in a moment" in the fire of his burning wrath, had not Jesus, "his chosen, stood before him in the gap to turn away his wrathful indignation."

This side of the Atonement, this unjust demand on men for a righteousness they could not render, necessitating a sacrifice to propitiate God for non-compliance with his exaction, has had its due effect on men's minds, and has alienated their hearts from God. No wonder that men turned away from a God who, like a passionate but unskilful workman, dashes to pieces the instrument he has made because it fails in its purpose, and, instead of blaming his own want of skill, vents his anger on the helpless thing that is only what he made it. Most naturally, also, have men shrunk from the God who "avengeth and is furious" to the tender, pitiful, human Jesus, who loved sinners so deeply as to choose to suffer for their sakes. They could owe no gratitude to an Almighty Being who created them and cursed them, and only consented to allow them to be happy on condition that another paid for them the misery he demanded as his due; but what gratitude could be enough for him who rescued them from the fearful hands of the living God, at the cost of almost intolerable suffering to himself? Let us remember that Christ is said to suffer the very torments of hell, and that his worst sufferings were when "fallen into his father's hands," out of which he has rescued us, and then can we wonder that the crucified is adored with a very ecstasy of gratitude? Imagine what it is to be saved from the hands of him who inflicted an agony admitted to be unlimited, and who took advantage of an infinite capacity in order to inflict an infinite pain. It is well for the men before whose eyes this awful spectre has flitted that the fair humanity of Jesus gives them a refuge to fly to, else what but despair and madness could have been the doom of those who, without Jesus, would have seen enthroned above the wailing universe naught but an infinite cruelty and an Almighty foe.

ON THE MEDIATION AND SALVATION OF ECCLESIASTICAL CHRISTIANITY.

We will admit, for argument's sake, the Deity of Jesus, in order that we may thus see the more distinctly that a mediator of any kind between God and man is utterly uncalled for. It is mediation, in itself, that is wrong in principle; we object to it as a whole, not to any special manifestation of it. Divine or human mediators, Jesus or his mother, saint, angel, or priest, we reject them each and all; our birthright as human beings is to be the offspring of the Universal Father, and we refuse to have any interloper pressing in between our hearts and His.

A man who has announced his intention to punish may be persuaded out of his resolution. New arguments may be adduced for the condemned one's innocence, new reasons for clemency may be suggested; or the judge may have been over-strict, or have been swayed by prejudice. Here a mediator may indeed step in, and find good work to do; but, in the name of the Eternal Perfection, what has all this to do with the judgment of God? Can His knowledge be imperfect, His mercy increased? Can His sentence be swayed by prejudice, or made harsh by over-severity?

Does the sentimental weakness of our age shrink from this doctrine, and whimper out that it is cold and stern? Ay, it is cold with the cold of the bracing sea-breeze, stringing to action the nerves enfeebled by hot-houses and soft-living; ay, it is stern with the blessed sternness of changeless law, of law which never fails us, never varies a hair's breadth. But in that law is strength; man's arm is feeble, but let him submit to the laws of steam, and his arm becomes dowered with a giant's force; conform to a law, and the mighty power of that law is on your side; "humble yourself under the mighty hand of God," who is the Universal Law, "and He shall lift you up."

So much for mediation. We turn with a still deeper repugnance to study the Christian idea of "Salvation." Mediation at least leaves us God, however it degrades and blasphemes Him, but salvation takes us altogether out of His Hands. Not content with placing a mediator between themselves and God, Christians cry out that He is still too near them; they must push Him yet further back, they must have a Saviour too, through whom all His benefits shall filter.

"Non ragione di lor, mai guardo e passo."

Further, is it impossible to make Christians understand that were Jesus all they say he is, we should still reject him; that were God all they say He is, we would, in that case, throw back His salvation. For were this awful picture of a soul-destroying Jehovah, of a blood-craving Moloch, endowed with a cruelty beyond human imagination, a true description of the Supreme Being, then would we take the advice of Job's wife, we would "curse God and die?" we would hide in the burning depths of His hell rather than dwell within sight of Him whose brightness would mock at the gloom of His creatures, and whose bliss would be a sneer at their despair. Were it thus indeed--

"O King of our salvation, Many would curse to thee, and I for one! Fling Thee Thy bliss, and snatch at Thy damnation, Scorn and abhor the rising of Thy sun.

But happily many, even among Christians, are beginning to shrink from this idea of salvation from the God in whom they say they place all their hopes. They put aside the doctrine, they gloss it over, they prefer not to speak of it. Free thought is leavening Christianity, and is moulding the old faith against its will. Christianity now hides its own cruel side, and only where the bold opponents of its creeds have not yet spread, does it dare to show itself in its real colours; in Spain, in Mexico, we see Christianity unveiled; here, in England, liberty is too strong for it, and it is forced into a semblance of liberality. The old wine is being poured into new bottles; what will be the result? We may, however, rejoice that nobler thoughts about God are beginning to prevail, and are driving out the old wicked notions about Him and His revenge. The Face of the Father is beginning, however dimly, to shine out from His world, and before the Beauty of that Face all hard thoughts about Him are fading away. Nature is too fair to be slandered for ever, and when men perceive that God and Nature are One, all that is ghastly and horrible must die and drop into forgetfulness. The popular Christian ideas of mediation and salvation must soon pass away into the limbo of rejected creeds which is being filled so fast; they are already dead, and their pale ghosts shall soon flit no longer to vex and harass the souls of living men.

ON ETERNAL TORTURE.

SOME time ago a Clergyman was proving to me by arguments many and strong that hell was right, necessary and just; that it brought glory to God and good to man; that the holiness of God required it as a preventive, and the justice of God exacted it as a penalty, of sin. I listened quietly till all was over and silence fell on the reverend denunciator; he ceased, satisfied with his arguments, triumphant in the consciousness that they were crushing and unassailable. But my eyes were fixed on the fair scene without the library window, on the sacrament of earth, the visible sign of the invisible beauty, and the contrast between God's works and the Church's speech came strongly upon me. And all I found to say in answer came in a few words: "If I had not heard you mention the name of God, I should have thought you were speaking of the Devil." The words, dropped softly and meditatively, had a startling effect. Horror at the blasphemy, indignation at the unexpected result of laboured argument, struggled against a dawning feeling that there must be something wrong in a conception which laid itself open to such a blow; the short answer told more powerfully than half an hour's reasoning.

The various classes of orthodox Christian doctrines should be attacked in very different styles by the champions of the great army of free-thinkers, who are at the present day besieging the venerable superstitions of the past. Around the Deity of Jesus cluster many hallowed memories and fond associations; the worship of centuries has shed around his figure a halo of light, and he has been made into the ideal of Humanity; the noblest conceptions of morality, the highest flights of enlightened minds, have been enshrined in a human personality and called by the name of Christ; the Christ-idea has risen and expanded with every development of human progress, and the Christ of the highest Christianity of the day is far other than the Christ of Augustine, of Thomas ? Kempis, of Luther, or Knox; the strivings after light, after knowledge, after holiness, of the noblest sons of men have been called by them a following of Jesus; Jesus is baptized in human tears, crucified in human pains, glorified in human hopes. Because of all this, because he is dear to human hearts and identified with human struggles, therefore he should be gently spoken of by all who feel the bonds of the brotherhood of man; the dogma of his Deity must be assailed, must be overthrown, because it is false, because it destroys the unity of God, because it veils from us the Eternal Spirit, the source of all things, but he himself should be reverently spoken of, so far as truthfulness permits, and this dogma, although persistently battled against, should be attacked without anger and without scorn.

There are other doctrines which, while degrading in regard to man's conception of God, and therefore deserving of reprobation, yet enshrine great moral truths and have become bound up with ennobling lessons; such is the doctrine of the Atonement, which enshrines the idea of selfless love and of self-sacrifice for the good of humanity. There are others again against which ridicule and indignation may rightly be brought to bear, which are concessions to human infirmity, and which belong to the childhood of the race; man may be laughed out of his sacraments and out of his devils, and indignantly reminded that he insults God and degrades himself by placing a priesthood or mediator between God and his own soul. But there is one dogma of Orthodox Christianity which stands alone in its atrocity, which is thoroughly and essentially bad, which is without one redeeming feature, which is as blasphemous towards God as it is injurious to man; on it therefore should be poured out unsparingly the bitterest scorn and the sharpest indignation. There is no good human emotion enlisted on the side of an Eternal Hell; it is not hallowed by human love or human longings, it does not enshrine human aspirations, nor is it the outcome of human hopes. In support of this no appeal can be made to any feeling of the nobler side of our nature, nor does eternal fire stimulate our higher faculties: it acts only on the lower, baser, part of man; it excites fear, distrust of God, terror of his presence; it may scare from evil occasionally, but can never teach good; it sees God in the lightning-flash that slays, but not in the sunshine which invigorates; in the avalanche which buries a village in its fall, but not in the rich promise of the vineyard and the joyous beauty of the summer day. Hell has driven thousands half-mad with terror, it has driven monks to the solitary deserts, nuns to the sepulchre of the nunnery, but has it ever caused one soul of man to rejoice in the Father of all, and pant, "as the hart panteth after the water-springs, for the presence of God"?

Among the evangelicals, only one voice, so far as I know, is heard to protest against eternal torture; and all honour is due to the Rev. Samuel Minton, for his rare courage in defying on this point the opinion of his "world," and braving the censure which has been duly inflicted on him. He seems to make "eternal" the equivalent of "irremediable" in some cases and of "everlasting" in others. He believes that the wicked will be literally destroyed, burnt up, consumed; the fact that the fire is eternal by no means implies, he remarks, that that which is cast into the fire should be likewise eternal, and that the fire is unquenchable does not prove that the chaff is unconsumable. "Eternal destruction" he explains as irreparable destruction, final and irreversible extinction. This theory should have more to recommend it to all who believe in the supernatural inspiration of the Bible, than the Broad Church explanation; it uses far less violence towards the words of Scripture, and, indeed, a very fair case may be made out for it from the Bible itself.

It is scarcely necessary to add to this small list of dissentients from orthodox Christianity, the Unitarian body; I do not suppose that there is such a phenomenon in existence as a Unitarian Christian who believes in an eternal hell.

Dr. Pusey, too, has a word to say about hell: "Gather in mind all that is most loathsome, most revolting--the most treacherous, malicious, coarse, brutal, inventive, fiendish cruelty, unsoftened by any remains of human feeling, such as thou couldst not endure for a single hour.... hear those yells of blaspheming, concentrated hate as they echo along the lurid vault of hell."

Protestantism chimes in, and Spurgeon speaks of hell: "Wilt thou think it is easy to lie down in hell, with the breath of the Eternal fanning the flames? Wilt thou delight thyself to think that God will invent torments for thee, sinner?" "When the damned jingle the burning irons of their torment, they shall say, 'for ever;' when they howl, echo cries, 'for ever.'"

I may allude, to conclude my quotations, to a description of hell which I myself heard from an eminent prelate of the English Church, one who is a scholar and a gentleman, a man of moderate views in Church matters, by no means a zealot in an ordinary way. In preaching to a country congregation composed mainly of young men and girls, he warned them specially against sins of the flesh, and threatened them with the consequent punishment in hell. Then, in language which I cannot reproduce, for I should not dare to sully my pages by repeating what I then listened to in horrified amazement, there ensued a description drawn out in careful particulars of the state of the suffering body in hell, so sickening in its details that it must suffice to say of it that it was a description founded on the condition of a corpse flung out on a dungheap and left there to putrefy, with the additional horror of creeping, slowly-burning flames; and this state of things was to go on, as he impressed on them with terrible energy, for ever and ever, "decaying but ever renewing."

It is said that there is no reason that we should not be contented in heaven while others suffer in hell, since we know how much misery there is in this world and yet enjoy ourselves in spite of the knowledge. I say, deliberately, of every one who does realise the misery of this world and remains indifferent to it, who enjoys his own share of the good things of this life, without helping his brother, who does not stretch out his hand to lift the fallen, or raise his voice on behalf of the down-trodden and oppressed, that that man is living a life which is the very antithesis of a Divine life--a life which has in it no beauty and no nobility, but is selfish, despicable, and mean. And is this the life which we are to regard as the model of heavenly beauty? Is the power to lead this life for ever to be our reward for self-devotion and self-sacrifice here on earth? Is a supreme selfishness to crown unselfishness at last? But this is the life which is to be the lot of the righteous in heaven. Snatched from a world in flames, caught up in the air to meet their descending Lord, his saints are to return with him to the heaven whence he came; there, crowned with golden crowns, they are to spend eternity, hymning the Lamb who saved them to the music of golden harps, harps whose melody is echoed by the curses and the wailings of the lost; for below is a far different scene, for there the sinners are "tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and the presence of the Lamb; and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever, and they have no rest day nor night."

"Depart, O sinner, to the chain! Enter the eternal cell; To all that's good and true and right, To all that's fair and fond and bright, To all of holiness and right, Bid thou thy last farewell."

Would to God that Christian men and women would ponder it well and think it out for themselves, and when they go into the worst parts of our great cities and their hearts almost break with the misery there, then let them remember how that misery is but a faint picture of the endless, hopeless, misery, to which the vast majority of their fellow-men are doomed.

Christian reader, do not be afraid to realise the future in which you say you believe, and which the God of Love has prepared for the home of some of his children. Imagine yourself, or any dear to you, plunged into guilt from which there is no redeemer, and where the voice cannot penetrate of him that speaks in righteousness, mighty to save. In the well-weighed words of a champion of Christian orthodoxy, think there is no reason to believe that hell is only a punishment for past offences; in that dark world sin and misery reproduce each other in infinite succession. "What if the sin perpetuates itself, if the prolonged misery may be the offspring of the prolonged guilt?" Ponder it well, and, if you find it true, then cast out from your creed the belief in a Jesus who loved the lost; blot out from your Bible every verse that speaks of a Father's heart; tear from your Prayer-books every page that prays to a Father in heaven. If the lowest of God's creatures is to be left in the foul embraces of sin for ever, God cannot be the Eternal Righteousness, the unconquerable Love. For what sort of Righteousness is that which rests idly contented in a heaven of bliss, while millions of souls capable of righteousness are bound by it in helpless sin; what sort of love is that which is satisfied to be repulsed, and is willing to be hated? As long as God is righteous, as long as God is love, so long is it impossible that men and women shall be left by him forever in a state to which our worst dens of earth are a very paradise of beauty and purity. Bible writers may have erred, but "Thou continuest holy, O Thou worship of Israel!" There is one revelation that cannot err, and that is written by God's finger on every human heart. What man recoils from doing, even at his lowest, can never be done by his Creator, from whose inspiration he draws every righteous thought. Is there one father, however brutalized, who would deliberately keep his child in sin because of a childish fault? one mother who would aimlessly torture her son, keeping him alive but to torment? Yet this, nothing less,--nay, a thousand times more, for it is this multiplied infinitely by infinite power of torture,--this is what Christians ask us to believe about our Father and our God, a glimmer from the radiance of whose throne falls on to our earth, when men love their enemies and forgive freely those who wrong them If this so-called orthodox belief is right, then is their gospel of the Love of God to the world a delusion and a lie; if this is true, the teaching of Jesus to publicans and harlots of the Fatherhood of God is a cruel mockery of our divinest instincts; the tale of the good Shepherd who could not rest while one sheep was lost is the bitterest irony. But this awful dogma is not true, and the Love of God cradles his creation; not one son of the Father's family shall be left under the power of sin, to be an eternal blot on God's creation, an endless reproach to his Maker's wisdom, an everlasting and irreparable mistake.

I have purposely put first my strong reprobation of eternal hell, because of its own essential hideousness, and because, were it ever so true, I should deem myself disgraced by acknowledging it as either loving or good. But it is, however, a satisfaction to note the feebleness of the arguments advanced in support of this dogma, and to find that justice and holiness, as well as love, frown on the idea of an eternal hell.

The justice of hell disposed of, we turn to the love of God. I have never heard it stated that hell is a proof of his great love to the world, but I take the liberty myself of drawing attention to it in this light. God, we are told, existed alone before ought was created; there perfect in himself, in happiness, in glory, he might have remained, say orthodox theologians. Then, we have a right to ask in the name of charity, why did he, happy himself, create a race of beings of whom the vast majority were to be endlessly and hopelessly miserable? Was this love? "He created man to glorify him." But was it loving to create those who would only suffer for his glory? Was it not rather a gigantic, an inconceivable selfishness?

"Man may be saved if he will." That is not to the point; God foreknew that some would be lost, and yet he made them. With all reverence I say it, God had no right to create sentient beings, if of one of them it can ever be truly said, "good were it for that man that he had never been born." He who creates, imposes on himself, by the very act of creation, duties towards his creatures. If God be self-conscious and moral, it is an absolute certainty that the whole creation is moving towards the final good of every creature in it. We did not ask to be made; we suffered not when we existed not; God, who has laid existence on us without our consent, is responsible for our final good, and is bound by every tie of righteousness and justice, not to speak of love, to make the existence he gave us, unasked, a blessing and not a curse to us. Parents feel this responsibility towards the children they bring into the world, and feel themselves bound to protect and to make happy those who, without them, had not been born. But, if hell be true, then every man and woman is bound not to fulfil the Divine command of multiplying the race, since by so doing they are aiding to fill the dungeons of hell, and they will, hereafter, have their sons and their daughters cursing the day of their birth, and overwhelming their parents with reproaches for having brought into the world a body, which God was thus enabled to curse with the awful gift of an immortal soul.

We must notice also that God, who is said to love righteousness, can never crush out righteousness in any-human soul. There is no one so utterly degraded as to be without one sign of good. Among the lowest and vilest of our population, we find beautiful instances of kindly feeling and generous help. Can any woman be more degraded than she who only values her womanhood as a means of gain, who drinks, fights, and steals? Let those who have been among such women say if they have not been cheered sometimes by a very ray of the light of God, when the most. degraded has shown kindness to an equally degraded sister, and when the very gains of sin have been purified by being; poured into the lap of a suffering and dying companion. Shall love and devotion, however feeble, unselfishness and sympathy, however transitory in their action, shall these stars of heaven be quenched in the blackness of the pit of hell? If it be so, then, verily, God is not the "righteous. Lord who loveth righteousness."

But we cannot leave out of our impeachment of hell that it injures man, as much as it degrades his conceptions of God. It cultivates selfishness and fear, two of his basest passions. There has scarcely perhaps been born into the world this century a purer and more loving soul than that of the late John Keble, the author of the "Christian Year." Yet what a terrible effect this belief had on him; he must cling to his belief in hell, because otherwise he would have no certainty of heaven:

"But where is then the stay of contrite hearts? Of old they leaned on Thy eternal word; But with the sinner's fear their hope?digt oder, um den Aufzug zu bewerkstelligen, absichtlich teilweise beseitigt wurde, was 1496 eine umfassende Reparatur erfordert h?tte. Jedenfalls h?tte es sich dann nur um den s?dlichen Turm, in dessen oberem Helmdurchbruch die Glocke aufgeh?ngt wurde, handeln k?nnen.

Die Erh?hung der T?rme bezog sich haupts?chlich auf den Aufbau neuer Glockenstuben mit weiten Schallfenstern, die ohne Verj?ngung beiderseits auf die unteren Stockwerke aufgesetzt wurden. Die an jeder Seite der T?rme angebrachten doppelten Schallfenster werden je durch ein weites und hohes Blendfenster mit drei senkrechten St?ben zusammengefasst. Die Spitzb?gen der eigentlichen Schallfenster f?llt einfaches Masswerk, Leibungen und St?be der Blende sind in schlichter Weise profiliert. Die W?nde sind vollst?ndig glatt behandelt, es fehlen also auch die Lisenen, welche am n?rdlichen Turm bis an das Gesims des sechsten Stockwerkes hinaufreichen. Unter dem oberen Abschluss dieses Stockwerkes zieht sich, ohne Abwechslung der Motive, ein Bogenfries hin, dessen Spitzen Knospenornamente zieren.

Dar?ber erhebt sich, durch eine aus zwei Hohlkehlen bestehende Profilierung wenig ?ber die Mauerflucht hervorragend, eine Kranzgalerie , in Herzblattmuster durchbrochen gearbeitet. Das siebente, ebenfalls quadratische aber engere Stockwerk ?ber der Plattform, ist wiederum glatt behandelt und hat jeweils in der Westseite eine T?re, durch welche man auf den schmalen Gang gelangt, und ausserdem auf jeder Seite zwei kleine viereckige Fenster. Der obere Teil dieses siebenten Stockwerkes wurde im s?dlichen Turm als W?chterwohnung eingerichtet. Ein Fries, ?hnlich dem des sechsten Stockwerkes, schliesst das Mauerwerk ab. Die schlanken Turmhelme setzen viereckig an und gehen durch Teilung der Kanten und Brechung derselben in ein gleichm?ssiges Achteck ?ber; der s?dliche Helm ist zweimal durchbrochen, zur Aufnahme der Stundenglocke unten und der Viertelstundenglocke oben. Knopf und Fahne bekr?nen das Ganze.

Einen Anspruch auf k?nstlerische Bedeutung k?nnen die T?rme auch in ihren neuen Bauteilen nicht erheben. Gerade in den beiden T?rmen mit ihrer einfachen, schlichten Behandlung kommt eben eigentlich so recht die Einfachheit und zugleich auch N?chternheit der N?rnberger Gegend zum Ausdruck. Hier unterscheidet sich die Kirche St. Sebald nur wenig von den Bauten der Nachbarorte, denn weder das n?rdliche Bayern, noch das angrenzende ?stliche Franken hat Kircht?rme aufzuweisen, welche sich besonderer Sch?nheit erfreuen. Am n?chsten verwandt mit den T?rmen von St. Sebald ist der Turm der Stadtpfarrkirche in Schwabach.

Der Baumeister der neuen Turmteile war Heinrich Kugler von N?rdlingen. Dort hatte er 1480 das Amt eines Kirchenbaumeisters bei St. Georg ?bernommen und in der Zeit bis 1494, wo er wegen Krankheit seine Stelle niederlegen musste, in der Hauptsache den oberen Teil des m?chtigen Turmes und die Pfeiler im Chore gebaut; die kriegerischen Verwicklungen der Reichsstadt mit Herzog Georg von Niederbayern-Landshut und insbesondere die Beurlaubung nach N?rnberg zum Ausbau der T?rme von St. Sebald hinderten ihn, am Bau von St. Georg in dieser Zeit mehr auszuf?hren. ?brigens k?me f?r einen kunstkritischen Vergleich doch eigentlich nur der obere Teil des N?rdlinger Turmes in Betracht; allein aus dem kleinen von Kugler ausgef?hrten St?ck, dem achteckigen Teil ?ber der zweiten Galerie, lassen sich keine Schl?sse auf die T?rme von St. Sebald ziehen, um so weniger, als Kugler dort genau wie bei St. Sebald durch die H?he der vorhandenen T?rme f?r den Weiterbau bereits gebunden war und ausserdem die im Gutachten des fr?heren Baumeisters Ensinger gegebenen Direktiven einzuhalten hatte.

Endlich ist f?r den Bau der T?rme noch ein Aufriss in sauberer Federzeichnung von Interesse, der sich im Archiv der Oberen Pfarrkirche zu Ingolstadt befindet. Er stellt im Massstab 1 : 20 den oberen Teil eines Turmes dar, der im wesentlichen mit den Glockenstuben von St. Sebald ?bereinstimmt und mit Wahrscheinlichkeit als ein Werkriss des Meisters Heinrich Kugler betrachtet werden darf. Die grossen Schallfenster mit ihrer Verblendung stimmen fast genau mit den ausgef?hrten Fenstern ?berein, nur die Strebepfeiler an den Ecken sind weiter gef?hrt und endigen etwa in der Mitte des sechsten Stockwerks mit Fialen und Kreuzblumen. Das siebente Stockwerk jedoch ist vollst?ndig anders geplant. Nur wenig schm?ler als das sechste steht es mit diesem durch ein kr?ftig profiliertes Gesims in Verbindung und hat erst zu oberst eine Kranzgalerie, so dass der Turmhelm ohne jede Vermittlung auf der Plattform aufsitzt, aber ebenfalls einen schmalen Gang freilassend. Das durchbrochene Motiv der Galerie sowie der Bogenfries unterhalb derselben, ferner Form, Gr?sse und Anordnung der Fenster der T?rmerwohnung sind die gleichen wie am ausgef?hrten Bau. Wie dieser Aufriss in das Archiv der Oberen Pfarrkirche zu Ingolstadt gelangt ist, muss vorerst noch unaufgekl?rt bleiben. Da er sich zwischen den Baupl?nen des Ulrich Heydenreich, Baumeisters zu Unser Sch?nen Lieben Frauen in Ingolstadt, erhalten hat, kann man vermuten, dass Heydenreich, als er gegen Ende des Jahrhunderts die schw?bischen St?dte besuchte und ihre Kirchen und insbesondere T?rme aufnahm, jenen Riss von seinem Kollegen Heinrich Kugler geschenkt bekommen und mit nach Ingolstadt gebracht habe.

Uns aber kann ein Vergleich des Aufrisses mit dem vollendeten Bauwerk lehren, welche Um?nderungen die urspr?nglichen Bauabsichten noch w?hrend der Ausf?hrung erfahren haben, ein Einblick in die T?tigkeit des Architekten, wie er uns, soweit es sich um die Zeiten des Mittelalters handelt, nur selten m?glich ist.

Die Restaurierungen der Kirche.

Bei einem so umfangreichen Bauwerke wie die Kirche St. Sebald wurden nat?rlich im Laufe der Zeit eine Reihe von gr?sseren und kleineren Reparaturen, namentlich am Aussenbau, erforderlich. Verschiedene Ver?nderungen sind auch ein Produkt der ver?nderten Bed?rfnisse oder des ver?nderten Zeitgeschmackes.

Die erste beglaubigte Restaurierung im Innern wurde 1493 vorgenommen: >>do wart die kirchen zu sant Sebolt geweist und verneut inwendig und wurd fertig auf sant Seboltz tag<<.

Nach der St?rke und Beschaffenheit der T?nche zu schliessen, welche die W?nde bis zur letzten Restaurierung ?berzog, wurde die Ausweissung ?fter wiederholt, m?glicherweise auch gelegentlich der Ende der f?nfziger und Anfang der sechziger Jahre des 17. Jahrhunderts bet?tigten Barockausstattung.

>>Im Jahre 1515 erlaubte der Rat dem Michel Beheim, der Cramer Kapellen in St. Sebalds Kirchen am Gew?lb und an den Fenstern und Altartafeln restaurieren zu lassen. Doch durfte er sein Wappen nirgends anbringen und musste er die alten Wappen stehen lassen.<< Gemeint ist wahrscheinlich die P?merkapelle zwischen der s?dlichen Sakristei und der Dreik?nigst?re.

Eine besonders umfangreiche Erneuerung erfuhr 1657 die Innenausstattung der Kirche . Sie bezog sich vor allem auf die Neuherstellung von Alt?ren und der Kanzel sowie der beiden Orgelemporen im Querschiff. Ausserdem wurden damals im Mittelschiff in der H?he der Triforien und im n?rdlichen Seitenschiff h?lzerne Emporen angebracht. Auf Einzelheiten dieser Erneuerung wird bei der Behandlung des Inventars zur?ckzukommen sein.

Soweit die Nachrichten ?ber die Restaurierungen im Innern.

Bei einigen von den zahlreichen Ver?nderungen am Aussenbau wurde durch die letzte Restaurierung der urspr?ngliche Zustand, so gut es eben m?glich war, wieder hergestellt. So mussten in erster Linie die beiden Dachwerkanbauten auf den Seitenschiffen an der Westwand des Ostchores weichen, in welchen die Blasb?lge f?r die beiden 1443 und 1447 errichteten Orgeln auf den Ostchoremporen untergebracht waren. Zur Zierde des Ganzen hatten diese Anbauten nicht gereicht.

Die ?lteste Gestalt der gotischen Seitenschiffd?cher war die, dass an ein ziemlich flaches, bis an den unteren Rand der Hochschiffsfenster heranreichendes Pultdach von den Wimpergen der Seitenschiffe aus Giebeld?cher anstiessen. In sp?terer Zeit waren die Giebeld?cher mitsamt den Wimpergspitzen und der Galerie beseitigt und das Pultdach steiler gelegt worden, so dass die reiche Dachbildung, die im Verh?ltnis zu der mannigfaltigen Gliederung der W?nde der Seitenschiffe stand, verloren ging und die unteren Partien der Hochschiffsfenster zugemauert werden mussten, was f?r den Innenraum des Langhauses einen betr?chtlichen Entgang an Licht bedeutete. Dieser ?belstand wurde durch die letzte Restaurierung infolge Tiefer- oder Flacherlegung des Pultdaches und Herausnahme der Fenstereinmauerungen behoben. Die Wimpergspitzen und die Galerie wurden erneuert, Giebel- oder Kapellend?cher gelangten jedoch nicht zur Wiederherstellung.

Nach der Vollendung des Ostchores z?hlte die Kirche sechs Eing?nge: die zwei romanischen Turmportale, im Westen, je zwei an der Nord- und an der S?dseite, die Anschreibt?re und die Eht?re, diesen entsprechend die Schult?re und die Dreik?nigst?re. Im Jahre 1480 wurde, aus welchem Bed?rfnis ist nicht bekannt, in der S?dwand des Ostchores gegen?ber der Schau unter dem Behaimschen Fenster eine niedrige T?re mit flachem Bogen und ohne Profilierung des Rahmens, nur mit Abschr?gung der Kanten, ausgebrochen. Drei Stufen f?hren zu derselben hinauf. Wegen des gegen?berliegenden ?ffentlichen Geb?udes wurde sie Schaut?re genannt.

Am 20. November 1490 kam in fr?her Morgenstunde in der W?chterstube des s?dlichen Turmes Feuer aus. Einen gr?sseren Umfang scheint dasselbe nicht angenommen zu haben, denn bauliche Ver?nderungen, die auf einen Brandschaden zur?ckzuf?hren w?ren, sind am Turm nicht wahrzunehmen. Es wird also nur ein Zimmerbrand gewesen sein.

Wie bereits hinl?nglich bekannt, musste die Galerie des Ostchores 1561 wegen Bauf?lligkeit abgenommen werden. Am 27. Mai nahmen im Auftrag des Rates der st?dtische Baumeister Joachim Tetzel und vier Handwerksmeister eine eingehende Besichtigung des Umganges vor und erstatteten hier?ber in einem ausf?hrlichen Gutachten Bericht . Danach sei die ganze Galerie durch die Einwirkung des Regen- und Schneewassers gleichsam zerfressen, insbesondere das die Galerie tragende Gesims, so dass einzelne St?cke, vor allem die ebenfalls stark besch?digten Wasserspeier, herabzufallen drohten. Eine Ausbesserung, von der man sich aber nicht viel versprechen k?nne, w?rde auf etwa 5000 fl. zu stehen kommen. Man halte die Abtragung der Galerie, die Deckung des Umganges mit Dachziegeln und die Anbringung kupferner Dachrinnen f?r die geeignetsten Massnahmen. Dem Antrag entsprechend wurde beschlossen und gehandelt. Und so verschwanden nach nicht ganz 200j?hrigem Bestehen die Galerie, die Wimperge der Fenster, soweit sie den Dachrand ?berragten, die Fialen der Strebepfeiler und die vielen Wasserspeier, welche zusammen eine pr?chtige Bekr?nung des Chores gebildet hatten, hinter der bei gr?sseren Festlichkeiten, vornehmlich bei Einz?gen von F?rsten, die Stadtpfeifer und -trompeter gar feierlich herabbliesen. Dass es sich damals nur um die Galerie des Ostchores und nicht auch um die der Seitenschiffe handelte, ist aus einer Angabe des vorerw?hnten gutachtlichen Berichtes zu schliessen, wonach die L?nge der Galerie 333 Stadtschuh, also genau dem Umfang des Ostchores entsprechend, abgesehen von der Westwand desselben, betragen hat.

In den Jahren 1571 bis 1647 wurden eine Anzahl Reparaturen am s?dlichen, dem sogenannten Schlagturm vorgenommen. 1571 fand eine Besichtigung der Kranzgalerie, die infolge Bauf?lligkeit das Schicksal der Ostchorgalerie teilen sollte, statt. Einige Jahre darauf, vielleicht 1577, wurde auf ein ausf?hrliches fachm?nnisches Gutachten hin, welches zugleich ein kurzes Projekt der Restaurierung enthielt und dem ein Plan der Galerie beigegeben war, dieselbe erneuert, und zwar genau im urspr?nglichen Stilcharakter. Die beabsichtigte Aufsetzung von Kugeln auf den Ecken des Gel?nders scheint unterblieben zu sein. Die ?brigen Renovierungen beziehen sich meist auf das ruin?s gewordene Zinndach. 1591 wurde der schlechte Zustand desselben zum ersten Mal festgestellt. 1609, 1613 und 1616 folgten weitere Besichtigungen und Ausbesserungen. Schliesslich, 1647, blieb nichts anderes ?brig, als eine Neubedachung vorzunehmen, und da man mit dem Zinn so schlechte Erfahrungen gemacht hatte, wurde Kupfer gew?hlt. Seitdem besteht an dem Turmpaar von St. Sebald ein f?r das ganze Stadtbild charakteristisch gewordener Farbenkontrast, der n?rdliche glatte Turmhelm zeigt sich in dem matten Grau des Zinnes, der s?dliche durchbrochene in der gr?n schimmernden Patina des oxydierten Kupfers.

Samstag den 3. August 1754 schlug ein >>Donnerwetter<< in die Kirche St. Sebald, und zwar ein >>Feuer-<< und ein >>Wasserstrahl<<. Der erstere fuhr durch das Dach des Langhauses >>gegen den Milchmarkt ?ber<< auf das darunter befindliche Dach >>auf den Boden, wo man in die kleine Orgel gehet<<, und z?ndete einen Querbalken an. Der Brand wurde sofort bemerkt und gel?scht. Der >>Wasserstrahl<< ging durch das Langhaus bei den T?rmen, eine >>ziembliche<< Anzahl Ziegel erschlagend, auf das Dach direkt ?ber der L?ffelholzkapelle, wo die T?rmer Holz und Sp?ne liegen hatten, und wo er mehrere Dachsparren v?llig zerschmetterte. Die entstandenen Dach?ffnungen wurden aus eigener Initiative des Almosenamtes noch am selbigen Abend mit Ziegeln zugedeckt. Die erforderlichen Ausbesserungen waren f?r den Bau selbst nicht von Belang.

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