Thomas Campbell

Thomas Campbell (1777–1844) was a Scottish poet best known in his lifetime for The Pleasures of Hope (1799) and for patriotic songs such as ‘Ye Mariners of England.’ He edited The New Monthly Magazine in the 1820s and helped found the University of London. Today he is read far less than he is quoted: this one couplet from ‘Hallowed Ground’ has outlived nearly everything else he wrote, carried along on gravestones and funeral cards by people who have never heard his name.