"While ignorance and poverty persist on the earth, books such as this cannot fail to be of value."
"While ignorance and poverty persist on the earth, books such as this cannot fail to be of value." So said the author of this novel. It consists of 5 volumes subdivided into 48 books, the last of which, called "Supreme Shadow, Supreme Dawn," ends with an epitaph of the main character who, having risen from destitution to prosperity, has sacrificed himself for the sake of his adopted daughter Cosette. FTP identify this 1862 work, a broad landscape of post-Revolution France, the tale of Jean Valjean, the most famous  work of Victor Hugo.
"While ignorance and poverty persist on the earth, books such as this cannot fail to be of value."
Les Miserables or The Outcasts or The Wretched