Approved at the first meeting of the Dublin society in November 1791, it read:I, - AB in the presence of God, do pledge myself to my country, that I will use all my abilities and influence in the attainment of an impartial and adequate representation of the Irish nation in parliament: and as a means of absolute and immediate necessity in accomplishing this chief good of Ireland, I shall do whatever lies in my power to forward a brotherhood of affection, an identity of interests, a communion of rights, and a union of power among Irishmen of every religious persuasion, without which every reform must be partial, not national, inadequate to the wants, delusive to the wishes, and insufficient for the freedom and happiness of this country.
[4]As government repression increased following the French declaration of war on Britain in February 1793, and as a move, beginning in Belfast, was made toward a more militant, potentially insurrectionary, organisation, the test was revised.
Delegates from seventy-two societies meeting in Belfast on 10 May 1795 approved amendments to Drennan's original test inserting the words "full representation of the people" and omitting reference to the Irish parliament.
[7][8]In the words of William James MacNeven (McNevin) who had taken the oath in Dublin from Mary Moore,[9][10] "the substance was so altered as to correspond with the progress of opinion, embracing both republicans and reformers".
[13] Adopted at a convention in Philadelphia, it opened membership to "all those who had suffered in the cause of freedom" (according the hostile reporting of the Federalist pamphleteer William Cobbett, this included free blacks),[14] and who would make the following pledge:[13]AB, in the presence of the most SUPREME BEING, do solemnly swear that I will, to the utmost of my power, promote the emancipation of Ireland from the tyranny of the British Government.