18 BBC Churchill Finest Hour Speech

What general Vagan has called the Battle of France is over. The Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British life and the long continuity of our institutions and our empire.

The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us. It's on the old that he will have to break us in this island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be freed, and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands.

But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new dark age, made more sinister and perhaps more protracted by the likes of the British science.

Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties. So bear ourselves, it's the British Empire and its Commonwealth's last for a thousand years. Men will still say this for their tiny tower.