Sharing Tone's frustration with Protestant Patriotism, William Drennan proposed to his largely Presbyterian friends in Belfast, "a benevolent conspiracy--a plot for the people" dedicated to the "The Rights of Man" and to "Real Independence" for Ireland. Attending their first meeting in Belfast in October 1791, with Cork man Thomas Russell, Tone re-iterated the thrust of his "Argument on behalf of the Catholics of Ireland":. the "imaginary Revolution of 1782" had failed to secure a representative and national government for Ireland because Protestants had refused to make common cause with Catholics. Ireland would continue to be governed in the exclusive interests of England and of the landed Ascendancy, so long as Irish Protestants remained "illiberal", "bigoted" and "blind".