Peguy is well aware that the greatest virtue is love, and that next to love, faith is the more significant of the virtues. It is a pilgrimage of faith — not hope. And so what Peguy has done is to portray the two dominant virtues as mature women and hope as a child. Faith and love will have the honor that is due to mature women. Yet, the irony is that a mature woman is motivated in life to live and to work for her children. (Peguy goes on to portray this beautifully later in the poem from the perspective of a father.) In this image in the poem, Faith and Love are holding the hands of Hope, and like a child swinging in its parents’ hands, Hope is physically led by the adults. But what leads the parent to swing the child? It is the hope for life, for the realization of faith, for the continuance of love.

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