Original sin as a reason to keep reforming
the doctrine of original sin
The identification supplies a theological reason for the chapter's third requirement: even a successful social order needs continuing supervision. In the preceding paragraphs a popular leader and a truth-telling newspaper become instruments of oppression. Here Christianity claims to have anticipated the danger. Reform cannot make its agents permanently incorruptible.
There is a close verbal parallel in Article IX of the Church of England's Articles of Religion: fallen humanity is naturally inclined toward evil, and the disorder remains even in the regenerate. Article XVI allows for renewed sin after baptism and subsequent repentance. These are useful doctrinal comparisons, not evidence that Chesterton borrowed this particular formulation from the Articles. Their persistence of moral danger supports his argument, but their subject is also humanity's relation to God and grace, not merely institutional decay. See Articles IX and XVI, inspected in the Church's online Book of Common Prayer text; the Articles were confirmed in 1571 and incorporated in the 1662 prayer book.
The later Catholic Catechism makes the qualification especially explicit. Original sin is an inherited deprivation, distinct from an individual's chosen wrongdoing; human nature is wounded rather than wholly destroyed (§§404–405). Baptism removes original sin while leaving an inclination requiring struggle. Section 407 expressly draws consequences for politics and social action. Thus Chesterton's rust and rot are an arresting political application, not a complete definition of the doctrine. His ‘naturally’ describes fallen humanity, not a claim that God's original creation was evil. See the Catechism, §§404–409, an official later comparison (first promulgated 1992; inspected English online text), not a source for the 1908 book.
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