Churchill quoted from this poem on several occasions in 1941 - the last line helped him to emphasize Britain's expectations of her ally in the West. On this day in 1941, the American Lend-Lease Act was passed, which allowed President Roosevelt to provide equipment to Britain, whose reserves were almost totally exhausted.
   In a speech broadcast from Chequers in the spring of 1941, Churchill spoke of how the United States were "very closely bound up with us now" and he recited from Clough's poem, remarking how its sentiments were "apt and appropriate to our fortunes tonight" and would be so judged "wherever the English language is spoken or the flag of freedom flies."

SAY NOT THE STRUGGLE NAUGHT AVAILETH
                                  - Arthur Hugh Clough

Say not the struggle naught availeth,
   The labor and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not nor faileth,
   And as things have been, things remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
   It may be, in yon smoke concealed,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
   And but for you, possess the field.

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
   Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back through creeks and inlets making
   Comes silent, flooding in, the main,

And not by eastern windows only,
   When daylight comes, comes in the light,
In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly,
   But westward, look, the land is bright,