Soon, however, assertions to the contrary were spread: and many serious reflections suggested themselves to his mind. ‘Surely,’ said he, ‘this age has more general information, and therefore more virtue, more wisdom, than the past. There cannot be another meal-tub plot. No Titus Oates could now impose his execrable fictions on mankind. Or is it possible that sophistry may have convinced itself that it is better twelve men, the partisans of reform, should die, than that Government should seem to have disgraced itself by asserting the existence of a treasonable conspiracy without any proof?’ At one moment he could not believe himself in danger: at the next, the facts that stared him in the face destroyed every ground of rational calculation, and left the mind bewildered in suspense. It was at this period that Mr Holcroft addressed the following letter to his daughter and her husband, who were in Devonshire.[12] ‘MY DEAR FRIENDS AND CHILDREN, The reason of my writing to you at this moment is to prevent any unnecessary alarm; to which, indeed, I hope you would not have been very liable, even if I had not written, and if you had previously heard the strange intelligence I am about to communicate, through any other channel. ‘It is asserted in the Morning Post of to-day, and I have before received the same information from various people, that a bill is to be presented to the Grand Jury, containing a charge of high-treason against thirteen persons, of whom I am one. As it is impossible that either this or any other crime against the Government can be proved on me (my principles and practice having been so totally opposite to such supposed crimes) I hope, and most seriously recommend that you will feel the same tranquillity I do. The charge is so false and so absurd, that it has not once made my heart beat. For my own part, I feel no enmity against those, who endeavour thus to injure me; being persuaded, that in this, as in all other instances, it is but the guilt of ignorance. They think they are doing their duty: I will continue to do mine, to the very utmost of my power; and on that will cheerfully rest my safety. I must again conjure you to feel neither alarm nor uneasiness. Remember the most virtuous of men are liable to be misunderstood, and falsely accused. But the virtuous man has no need to fear accusation. If it be true that my name is in the indictment, it will oblige me again to defer the happiness of seeing you, and the hope of recruiting my health by the excursion. Of the latter it is true I have need, and to be a witness of your happiness would give me no small pleasure: but the man of fortitude knows how to submit to all necessities; and if he be wise, frequently to turn events which others consider as most disastrous, to some beneficent end. Shall I own to you, that though I could not wish to be falsely accused, yet being so accused, I now feel an anxious desire to be heard?