And, on the other hand, if he is accused of tortures and bloodshed, why, the whole of the Old Testament is full of them! Jehovah Himself pours out blood like water, and exterminates men as if they were flies.

It is well not to forget that the world then still lived under the Law of Fear.

So it is not very surprising that, with a view to terrifying his enemies, whose manners and customs were not indeed any milder than his own, he should have tortured the inhabitants of Rabbah and baked the Ammonites.
"But in contrast to these acts of violence and the sins which he expiated, see how generous he was to Saul, and admire the magnanimity and charity of the man whom the followers of Renan would have us regard as a bandit chief and outlaw.

Remember, too, that he taught the world, as yet ignorant, the virtues which at a later time Christ was to preach--humility in its most touching form, and repentance in its bitterest shape.

When the prophet Nathan reproved him for the murder of Uriah, he confessed his sin with tears, fell on his face before God, bravely accepted the most terrible punishment: incest and murder in his family, the rebellion and death of his son, treason, misery, and a desperate flight in the woods; and with what urgency he implores for pardon in the '_Miserere_,' with what love and contrition he cries to the God he had offended! "He was a man whose vices were small and few if compared with those of the kings of his time--of admirable and exceptional virtues if compared with those of sovereigns of any time of every age.