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What religious views did John Dryden defend in Religio Laici?
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John Dryden
John Dryden, oil painting by Sir Godfrey Kneller, 1693; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
In his 1682 poem Religio Laici; or, A Laymanâs Faith, John Dryden defended the tenets of Anglicanism.1
Written in a plain style, the work served as an argument for the consolations of the Church of England while simultaneously positioning itself against three specific groups: unbelievers, Protestant dissenters, and Roman Catholics. This stance marked a distinct period in Dryden's life, as he would later convert to Roman Catholicism in 1685 and subsequently write The Hind and the Panther (1687) to defend his new faith against the Anglican church and other sects.21