. Schell attended the Gran ducal Lyceum of
Freiburg and in 1868 joyned the local seminary. Then he studied
theology and
philosophy at the
University of Freiburg, where he had
Constantine von Schäzler as professor of Scholastic
dogmatics, meeting Jakob Sengler, one of the later Christian idealists. In 1870, Schell was dismissed by the seminary (for disciplinary reasons) and moved to
University of Würzburg, starting to work with
Franz Brentano to his PhD dissertation in
Philosophy, titled
Die Einheit des Seelenlebens aus den Principien der Aristotelischen Philosophy. In 1872, he delivered the dissertation to Sengler, who was professor at the University of Freiburg. The work was published in 1873 and in the same year Brentano left the Roman Catholic Church. Until his death Schell remained an assiduous apprentice of the Catholic student association named
Walhalla Würzburg. On 17 August 1873 Schell received the priesthood under the hands of Johann Valentin von Reißmann (1807-1875), the then bishop of Würzburg. For six years he covered the role of
chaplain and teacher of religion in
Amorbach and in Obertheres. In 1879, he moved to
Rome to complete his theological formation. Two years later, he returned in Germany and was employed in
Margetshöchheim,
Dimbach and
Marktheidenfeld, and meanwhile he also applied to his thesis in theology, whose title was
Das Wirken des dreieinigen Gottes. In November 1883, this work was accepted as a doctoral dissertation by the
University of Tübingen and it was finally published two years later. During the 1884/5 wintry semester, Schell was appointed in Würzburg as
extraordinary professor of
apologetics,
archeology and history of the Christian art. In 1888, he got a chair of Christian apologetics and Christian archeology. Two years later, Schell become ordinary professor of dogmatics and in 1894 professor of
comparative theology and history of the
Christian art. In 1892, he began to work as university pastor and his Dominical sermons become very popular, as he referred in 1899. In 1893, after the publication of
Katholische Dogmatik (in three parts), the local bishop blocked his promotion to the chair of dogmatics. Subsequently, the monographies
Der Katholicismus als Princip des Fortschritts (1897) e
Die neue Zeit und der alte Glaube (1898) gave him an international reputation, but they
were indexed by the Roman Curia on 24 February 1899. This decision caused resentment in Würzburg and beat
Neothomist theologians accused his thought of being
monist,
rationalist and
Protestant. Between 1901 and 1905 Scheel published
Religion und Offenbarung,
Jahwe und Christus and
Das Evangelium und seine weltgeschichtliche Bedeutung, that didn't cause particular criticisms within the Roman Catholich Church. On 31 May 1906 Schell died at age 56 of
heart failure. The funeral took place on 11 June 1906 at the university church of Würzburg. On 18 July 1908 it was unveiled a public monument in his honour, an initiative which many Roman Catholics saw as a provocation. Subsequently, Schell's chair at the University of Würzburg was assigned to professor
Philipp Kneib. The Schell's writings have been substantially rehabilitated only after the
Second Vatican Council. ==Works==