But I think this book may well start where our argument started—in the
neighbourhood of the madhouse. Modern masters of science are much impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The ancient
masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that necessity. They began with the fact of sin—a fact as practical as potatoes. Whether or no
man could be washed in miraculous waters, there was no doubt at any rate that he wanted washing. But certain religious leaders in London, not mere
materialists, have begun in our day not to deny the highly disputable water, but to deny the indisputable dirt. Certain new theologians dispute
original sin, which is the only part of Christian theology which can really be proved. Some followers of the Reverend R. J. Campbell, in their
almost too fastidious spirituality, admit divine sinlessness, which they cannot see even in their dreams. But they essentially deny human sin,
which they can see in the street. The strongest saints and the strongest skeptics alike took positive evil as the starting-point of their argument.
If it be true (as it certainly is) that a man can feel exquisite happiness in skinning a cat, then the religious philosopher can only draw one of two
deductions. He must either deny the existence of God, as all atheists do; or he must deny the present union between God and man, as all Christians
do. The new theologians seem to think it a highly rationalistic solution to deny the cat.
Orthodoxy, first published in 1908, by G. K. Chesterton, is in the public domain, and available from Project Gutenberg. The previous post in this series is here.
Thanks for reading! Read Chesterton.
Musings on science, the Bible, and fantastic literature (and sometimes basketball and other stuff).
God speaks to us through the Bible and the findings of science, and we should listen to both types of revelation.
The title is from Psalm 84:11.
The Wikipedia is usually a pretty good reference. I mostly use the World English Bible (WEB), because it is public domain. I am grateful.
License
I have written an e-book, Does the Bible Really Say That?, which is free to anyone. To download that book, in several formats, go here.
The posts in this blog are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. You can copy and use this material, as long as you aren't making money from it. If you give me credit, thanks. If not, OK.
The posts in this blog are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. You can copy and use this material, as long as you aren't making money from it. If you give me credit, thanks. If not, OK.
Sunday, January 04, 2015
Excerpts from Orthodoxy, by Gilbert K. Chesteron, 3
Labels:
Chesterton,
G. K. Chesterton,
original sin,
Orthodoxy,
sin
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