Chapter 355 Four "immortal livers"

The previous terrible fight, which we had seen several rounds, began again. Jacob and the angel only fought for one night.It's a pity how many times we have seen Jean Valjean captured by his own conscience in the dark, fighting with it desperately. Unheard of fierce fight!Sometimes it's slipping, sometimes it's land subsidence.How many times has this conscience, fanatical in pursuit of justice, gripped and overwhelmed him!How many times, this inescapable truth, had kneeled on his chest!How many times, he was knocked to the ground by the light, begging for mercy!How many times had this implacable light that the bishop had kindled in him, in his heart, dazzled his eyes when he wished not to see it!How many times has he risen again in the struggle, clinging to the rock, relying on sophistry, rolling in the dust, sometimes crushing his conscience, sometimes overthrown by it!How many times, after hesitations, after a treacherous specious inference based on selfishness, did he hear an angry conscience cry out in his ears: "Conspirator! Shameless!" Tossing and turning convulsively before the undeniable duty!Resistance to God.Sad sweat.How many hidden wounds, only he himself felt that he was still bleeding!How much pain had he suffered in his miserable life!How many times has he stood up again, bloody, mortally wounded, and frustrated, and suddenly realized, despaired in his heart, but peaceful in his soul!Although he failed, he felt victorious.His conscience, which had dislocated his limbs, tormented him, broken his tendons, and broken his bones, stood awe-inspiring above him, shining brightly, and saying to him in serenity: "Now, all is well!"

But after such a painful struggle, alas!What a miserable peace this is! This night, however, Jean Valjean felt that he was fighting his last battle. A heartbreaking question arises. Destiny is not always straight, and it is not a straight road that they open before the doomed man; there are dead ends, dead ends, dark turns, and anxious intersections of many basins.Jean Valjean was at this moment stopping at one of the most dangerous intersections. He has reached the most important intersection of good and evil.This dark intersection was right in front of his eyes.This time, as in previous tortuous twists and turns, two roads appeared before him, one tempted him, the other terrified him.Which way should we go?

A terrible way is that when we look into the darkness, we can see a mysterious finger pointing us. Once again Jean Valjean had to choose between the terrible haven and the alluring trap. It is said that the soul can heal but fate cannot.Is this true?What a dreadful thing, an irredeemable fate! The problem that arises is this: What was Jean Valjean's attitude to the happiness of Cosette and Marius?This happiness is what he wanted, it was created by him, and he made it come true with all his painstaking efforts. Looking at this result at this moment, he feels satisfied, just like a swordsmith who sees the steaming sword drawn from his chest. On the knife, there is a mark of its own casting.

Cosette has Marius, and Marius has Cosette.They have everything they need, and they are not short of wealth.This is all caused by him. But this happiness already exists and is in front of him, how will he, Jean Valjean, treat it?Did he insist on entering into this happiness?Does it look like it belongs to him?Cosette had belonged to another man, of course, but could he, Jean Valjean, have maintained all the relations between him and Cosette?As always, as an occasional but respected father?Could he enter Cosette's house in peace?Could he, without a word, bring his past into this future life?Does he feel empowered to go in and sit in this bright family with the mask on?Can he shake hands with innocent children with his miserable hands, smiling?Could he place the feet of the legally dishonorable shadow on the quiet fire-wood in Gillenormand's living room?Could he enter thus and share his fortune with Cosette and Marius?Will he deepen the shadow on his brow and thicken the cloud on their brow?Would he mix his misfortune with their happiness?Continue to hide it?In a word, beside these two lucky ones, he will be the gloomy mute of fate?

We have to get used to the myriads and series of dooms before we dare face some dire problems when they lay bare before us.Good or evil is behind this stern question mark.What are you going to do?The sphinx was asking him. Jean Valjean, accustomed to these tests, looked intently at the Sphinx. He considered this cruel question from all sides. Cosette, this lovely being, is the raft on which the drowning man is saved.what to do?Hold on to it, or let go? If he catches up, he can escape the calamity and return to the sun, he can make the bitter water flow from his clothes and hair, he will be saved, and he will live.

Let go? That is the abyss. He negotiates painfully with the mind.Or, to be more precise, he was fighting; he was punching and kicking, he was furious, his heart was sometimes against his will, sometimes against his confidence. Crying bitterly was a kind of happiness for Jean Valjean.This might wake him up.But it started off quite violently.A turbulent wave, stronger than the ones that had driven him to Arras before, broke out in his heart as if unchained.The past came back to meet the present face to face; he compared it, and wept bitterly, and as the floodgates of tears opened, the disappointed man could not stand up.

He felt his way out was blocked. It is a pity that this kind of fierce boxing between selfishness and responsibility, when we retreat step by step in front of our inalienable ideals, we will be confused and stubbornly resist. Hoping for the possibility of escape, we were looking for a way out when suddenly we came across a wall behind us.What a dreadful hindrance this is! Feel the sacred shadow blocking the way! The majestic God, I can't get rid of it no matter what! So dealing with conscience is endless.Brutus, give up!Cato, you give up.Conscience is a bottomless pit for God's sake.We may throw our life's work into this well, our possessions, our wealth, our achievements, our liberty or our country, our comfort, our rest, our happiness.more!more!more!Empty the bottle!Turn the can on its side!Finally, you have to put your heart into it.

In the smoke somewhere in the ancient hell, there is one such barrel. Can't you be forgiven for refusing to do so in the end?Has the right to torture people endlessly?Is not the length of the chain beyond the endurance of man?Who would blame Sisyphus and Jean Valjean if they said: "Enough!" The obedience of matter is limited by friction; is there no limit to the obedience of the soul?Can eternal fidelity be demanded if eternal motion does not exist? The first step is nothing, the last step is arduous.What was the incident at Shangmadi compared with Cosette's marriage and its aftermath?What is it compared to going back to the cell and losing everything?

what!How dark you are at this first step to take!Step two, how dark you are! How can you not turn your head away this time? There is a noble character in the martyr, a corrosive nobility.It is a sanctifying ordeal.At the beginning, I could bear it. I sat on a red-hot iron throne, put a red iron crown on my head, took over the fiery red iron globe, held a fiery red scepter, and put on a flaming coat. Could it be that the miserable flesh Can't resist for a moment, is there never a time to refuse corporal punishment? At last Jean Valjean fell silent in disappointment. He weighed, he meditated, he considered this mysterious balance of light and dark that alternately rises and falls.

Let these two promising children bear his sentence, or he himself completes his irremediable sinking.One side sacrifices Cosette, the other sacrifices himself. What conclusion did he draw?What decision was taken?How will he finally answer the interrogation of this unchanging fate in his heart?Which door did he decide to open?Which side of his life did he decide to switch off and seal off?Surrounded by unfathomable cliffs, what is his choice?Which end did he accept?To which of these abysses did he nod his assent? He had been dizzy and brooding all night. He stayed in the same position until dawn, on the bed with his upper body thrown on his knees, overwhelmed by the great fate, perhaps crushed, alas!His fists were clenched, his arms stretched out at right angles, like a man who has just been taken down from a cross and thrown there face to face.He stayed there for twelve hours, twelve hours in a long winter night, he was freezing cold, but he didn't raise his head, and he didn't say a word.Motionless, like a corpse, his thoughts rolled in the ground and rose again, sometimes like a hydra, sometimes like a vulture.He was as motionless as a dead man; suddenly he began to tremble convulsively, and kissed Cosette's clothes again with his mouth; only then did he see that he was alive.

who?people?Since Jean Valjean was alone and had no one around? This is a "person" in the dark.