This is a kind of dramatic poem in which a Joan, not yet entrusted with her mission, engages in dialogue with different interlocutors about matters related to what the title indicates—that is, the central virtue of Christianity. Of these matters, two are perhaps the most significant, also in terms of length.
The first concerns the permissibility of praying for or worrying about the souls of the damned. Joan feels compelled to do so, even though her interlocutor insists on sound doctrine, according to which the damned have already made their final choice, and any concern for them is futile.
The second is what we might call the mystery of the apostles’ flight. “I would never abandon him,” Joan insists again and again, while, once more, the other voice urges her not to “do a Simon Peter,” as one might say today, reminding her in countless ways of what is also sound doctrine—namely, that we are capable, as fallen beings, of the most abject behavior.
It seems to be, then, a confrontation between overflowing virtue and theological reason, the heart’s impulse restrained by the right understanding of revealed truth.
From a formal point of view, what is most striking in this work is its repetitive, insistent style, which strongly recalls the Gospel according to John, with those ideas repeated again and again with nuances or variations, like an enveloping maneuver designed to eventually capture the truth.