Dryden, John, the distinguished English poet, was born at Aldwinkle August 9, 1631. He attended Westminster School and entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1650, taking his A.B. in 1654. He was of Puritan blood, and his first great poem was Heroic Stanzas on the Death of Oliver Cromwell, 1658. Soon after the restoration he became a Royalist, and was made Poet Laureate in 1670. He did not remain, however, in the Church of England, but in 1785 he became a Romanist. He died May 18, 1701.