of a tear
in the eye of the law, no one knows what justice according to God,
running in inverse sense to justice according to men. He perceived amid
the shadows the terrible rising of an unknown moral sun; it horrified
and dazzled him. An owl forced to the gaze of an eagle.

He said to himself that it was true that there were exceptional cases,
that authority might be put out of countenance, that the rule might
be inadequate in the presence of a fact, that everything could not
be framed within the text of the code, that the unforeseen compelled
obedience, that the virtue of a convict might set a snare for the virtue
of the functionary, that destiny did indulge in such ambushes, and
he reflected with despair that he himself had not even been fortified
against a surprise.

He was forced to acknowledge that goodness did exist. This convict had
been good. And he himself, unprecedented circumstance, had just been
good also. So he was becoming depraved.

He found that he was a coward. He conceived a horror of himself.

Javert's ideal, was not to be human, to be grand, to be sublime; it was
to be irreproachable.

Now, he had just failed in this.

How had he come to such a pass? How had all this happened? He could not
have told himself. He clasped his head in both hands, but in spite of
all that he could do, he could not contrive to explain it to himself.

He had certainly always entertained the intention of restoring Jean
Valjean to the law of which Jean Valjean was the captive, and of which
he, Javert, was the slave. Not for a single instant while he held him
in his grasp had he confessed to himself that he entertained the idea of
releasing him. It was, in some sort, without his consciousness, that his
hand had relaxed and had let him go free.

All sorts of interrogation points flashed before his eyes. He put
questions to himself, and made replies to himself, and his replies
frightened him. He asked himself: "What has that convict done, that
desperate fellow, whom I have pursued even to persecution, and who has
had me under his foot, and who could have avenged himself, and who
owed it both to his rancor and to his safety, in leaving me my life, in
showing mercy upon me? His duty? No. Something more. And I in showing
mercy upon him in my turn--what have I done? My duty? No. Something
more. So there is something beyond duty?" Here he took fright; his
balance became disjointed; one of the scales fell into the abyss, th