Campbell denied a historical Fall, not the existence of wrongdoing

Some followers of the Reverend R.J. Campbell

Campbell's The New Theology (first published 1907; inspected in Gutenberg's transcription of Macmillan's April 1907 reprint) supplies a more complicated opponent than the closing joke suggests. The City Temple minister explicitly rejects a historical Fall, but defines sin as selfishness and protests that critics misrepresent him as denying its existence. His account of animal suffering acknowledges its reality. His deeper premise is that human beings remain fundamentally one with God, while finite existence serves divine self-expression (chapters III–IV). Chesterton's dilemma attacks that premise: how can deliberate cruelty express a sinless God? The disagreement concerns the explanation and theological status of evil, rather than whether cruelty happens. Since Chesterton specifies unnamed followers, Campbell's book does not conclusively refute his report about them; it does prevent treating that report as an adequate summary of Campbell himself. Read chapters III–IV.

Sources

R. J. Campbell, The New Theology
Title and copyright leaves; chapter III, concluding discussion of divine-human unity; chapter IV, 'The relation of evil and pain,' 'The nature of sin,' 'The Fall,' and 'The truth beneath the doctrine of the Fall'

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