Les Miserables - Fantine - Book First - A Just Man - Chapter I

Aug 25, 2026

Uploaded by Maeve

Les Miserables opens with the Preface explaining how social laws and customs can create suffering that mirrors hell, leaving the degradations of men through pauperism, corruption of women through hunger, and crippling of children through lack of light unresolved. Set against this moral frame, the narrative begins with Fantine and Book First, introducing M. Myriel, a bishop whose past rumors and political upheavals shape his transformation from a noble family to priesthood and bishopric after the fall of old society.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryStory & Novel

FormatPDF

Pages2453

Reading Time62 h 58 min

AccessFree to download

Preface

Fantine

Book First—A Just Man

Chapter I: M. Myriel

Les Miserables By Victor Hugo Translated by Isabel F. Hapgood Published by Planet eBook. Visit the site to download free eBooks of classic literature, books and novels. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons AttributionNoncommercial 3.0 United States License. VOLUME I. FANTINE. [Free eBooks at](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com)[ Planet eBook.com](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com) 3 PREFACE So long as there shall exist, by virtue of law and custom, decrees of damnation pronounced by society, artificially creating hells amid the civilization of earth, and adding the element of human fate to divine destiny; so long as the three great problems of the century— the degradation of man through pauperism, the corruption of woman through hunger, the crippling of children through lack of light—are unsolved; so long as social asphyxia is possible in any part of the world;—in other words, and with a still wider significance, so long as ignorance and poverty exist on earth, books of the nature of Les Miserables cannot fail to be of use. HAUTEVILLE HOUSE, 1862. FANTINE 4 Les Miserables BOOK FIRST—A JUST MAN [Free eBooks at](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com)[ Planet eBook.com](Free eBooks at Planet eBook.com) 5 CHAPTER I M. MYRIEL In 1815, M. Charles-Francois-Bienvenu Myriel was Bishop of D——He was an old man of about seventy-five years of age; he had occupied the see ofD——since 1806. Although this detail has no connection whatever with the real substance of what we are about to relate, it will not be superfluous, if merely for the sake of exactness in all points, to mention here the various rumors and remarks which had been in circulation about him from the very moment when he arrived in the diocese. True or false, that which is said of men often occupies as important a place in their lives, and above all in their destinies, as that which they do. M. Myriel was the son ofa councillor of the Parliament of Aix; hence he belonged to the nobility of the bar. It was said that his father, destining him to be the heir of his own post, had married him at a very early age, eighteen or twenty, in accordance with a custom which is rather widely prevalent in parliamentary families. In spite of this marriage, however, it was said that Charles Myriel created a great deal of talk. He was well formed, though rather short in stature, elegant, graceful, intelligent; the whole of the first portion of his life 6 Les Miserables had been devoted to the world and to gallantry. The Revolution came; events succeeded each other with precipitation; the parliamentary families, decimated, pursued, hunted down, were dispersed. M. Charles Myriel emigrated to Italy at the very beginning of the Revolution. There his wife died of a malady of the chest, from which she had long suffered. He had no children. What took place next in the fate of M. Myriel? The ruin of the French society of the olden days, the fall of his own family, the tragic spectacles of ‘93, which were, perhaps, even more alarming to the emigrants who viewed them from a distance, with the magnifying powers ofterror,—did these cause the ideas of renunciation and solitude to germinate in him? Was he, in the midst of these distractions, these affections which absorbed his life, suddenly smitten with one of those mysterious and terrible blows which sometimes overwhelm, by striking to his heart, a man whom public catastrophes would not shake, by striking at his existence and his fortune? No one could have told: all that was known was, that when he returned from Italy he was a priest. In 1804, M. Myriel was the Cure of B—— [Brignolles]. He was already advanced in years, and lived in a very retired manner. About the epoch of the coronation, some petty affair connected with his curacy—just what, is not precisely known—took him to Paris. Among other powerful persons to whom he went to solicit aid for his parishioners was M. le Cardinal Fesch. One day, when the Empe

FAQs

What is the purpose of the Preface in Les Miserables?

It argues that as long as society’s decrees and customs produce suffering resembling hell—through poverty, hunger, and neglect—books like Les Miserables remain necessary and useful.

Who is M. Myriel in Chapter I?

M. Charles-Francois-Bienvenu Myriel is introduced as the Bishop of D——, an elderly man whose life has been shaped by the rumors and upheavals around him.

How does Napoleon’s visit relate to M. Myriel’s appointment as bishop?

After noticing the Cure while visiting his uncle, Napoleon asks about him; the Cardinal reveals his name, and M. Myriel is later appointed Bishop of D——.

Aug 25, 2026

Uploaded by Maeve