Jean Valjean was happy at the convent (working as a gardener) seeing Cosette everyday (as a schoolgirl). He felt that certainly she would become a nun, being surrounded by soft inducements (by other nuns at the convent) to do so. He would grow old & die, & she would also spend the rest of her life there. He felt that Cosette had a right to know the world before renouncing it. To deny her all the joys (doubtful?) of life on the pretext of sparing her the trials (certain!) was to do injustice to her. If later Cosette regretted her vows, she may hate him. So he decided to leave the convent.
It should be noted that the words in the parenthesis above are not in the text. Here it may be recalled that both Moses in his Ten commandments & Jesus Christ (as he told Martha & Mary) put love of God above human love. Jean Valjean, having overlooked this, pulled her onto a worldly life, where as an example of poetic justice, both Cosette & Marius (whose life Jean Valjean saved) were ungrateful (unlike Eppie in "Silas Marner" who even after her marriage did not forsake Silas) & neglected Jean Valjean as he had feared she might do if she had become a nun & thereby probably lost his interest in life, & gradually faded away.
This putting Divine love higher than human love is present in Hinduism also. Bharata disobeyed his mother for God (Rama). Prahlada disobeyed his father Hiranyakashipu for Lord Vishnu. Akka Mahadevi & Mirabai went against the wishes of their husbands for Shiva & Krishna respectively.
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