Blood, Toil, Tears and Sweat

“Blood, Toil, Tears and Sweat” is at its core a piece of persuasive writing composed with the express purpose of raising support for a three-pronged state of affairs: Churchill’s appointment to the position of prime minister, the creation of a new coalition government, and the waging of war against Germany until victory. The argument that Churchill constructs in order to generate support for these issues is relatively simple, consisting of four major assertions made either implicitly or explicitly: first, Britain is currently in a historically significant but precarious situation due to the war in Europe; second, the war will cause great and sustained hardship; third, despite this hardship, it is necessary that the war be fought both out of moral obligation and in self-defense; and finally, victory is achievable if the nation comes together and fights with its combined might. This argument is intrinsically linked with the speech’s most important themes: The Historical Significance of Current Events, War as a Necessary Evil, and The Importance of National Unity.

This argument is at the heart of Churchill’s foreign policy during WWII and can be observed as a common throughline in many of Churchill’s most famous addresses from 1940, including his “We Shall Fight Them on the Beaches” and “This Was Their Finest Hour” speeches.