The enemies of the Church were known to be powerful, numerous, and of course unscrupulous.

But surely this Brutus would not raise a dagger against this Caesar! And yet, if not, what was the meaning of those words?
And then men and women began to tell each other,--the men and women who are the very salt of the earth in this England of ours,--that their Brutus, in spite of his great qualities, had ever been mysterious, unintelligible, dangerous, and given to feats of conjuring.

They had only been too submissive to their Brutus.
Wonderful feats of conjuring they had endured, understanding nothing of the manner in which they were performed,--nothing of their probable results; but this feat of conjuring they would not endure.
And so there were many meetings held about the country, though the time for combined action was very short.
Nothing more audacious than the speaking of those few words to the bucolic electors of East Barsetshire had ever been done in the political history of England.

Cromwell was bold when he closed the Long Parliament.

Shaftesbury was bold when he formed the plot for which Lord Russell and others suffered.