[I]t does seem true, almost a truism, that Churchill's famous phrases – 'blood, sweat, toil and tears', 'their finest hour', 'we shall never surrender' – did express something inarticulate, perhaps dormant but perhaps not, in the hearts and minds of his countrymen, of most classes. They achieved their effect by a heroic yet very simple expression of the will to resist ('we shall fight them in the hills') and by invoking the naïve sense of nationhood and history which most of his literate subjects shared with him... Churchill clearly achieved and retained a popularity far greater than – because different in kind from – that of any peacetime leader... He radiated his courage over the microphone as successfully as he pumped blood into the sclerotic arteries of the House of Commons... And, whatever their private opinions, all classes were clear that there nowhere was, nor ever had been, anyone quite like this man they were cheering. Such singularity, in such a high position, could only amount to greatness.

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "[I]t does seem true, almost a truism, that Churchill's famous phrases – 'blood, sweat, toil and tears', 'their finest hour', 'we shall never surrender' – did express something inarticulate, perhaps dormant but perhaps not, in the hearts and minds of his countrymen, of most classes. They achieved their effect by a heroic yet very simple expression of the will to resist ('we shall fight them in the hills') and by invoking the naïve sense of nationhood and history which most of his literate subjects shared with him... Churchill clearly achieved and retained a popularity far greater than – because different in kind from – that of any peacetime leader... He radiated his courage over the microphone as successfully as he pumped blood into the sclerotic arteries of the House of Commons... And, whatever their private opinions, all classes were clear that there nowhere was, nor ever had been, anyone quite like this man they were cheering. Such singularity, in such a high position, could only amount to greatness." in the context of "Angus Calder, The People's War: Britain, 1939–45 (1969), pp. 96–98" to mean that wisdom is timeless.