To agree to a divorce – to give her her freedom – would mean, as he looked at it, to deprive himself of the only thing that bound him to life, the children he loved, and to deprive her of the last support on the path of virtue and cast her to perdition. As a divorced wife she would form a union with Vronsky which would be both illegal and criminal, because according to the law of the Church a wife may not remarry as long as her husband is living.
Y para ella representaba quitarle el último apoyo en el camino del bien y empujarla hacia el abismo. Si Ana se convertía en una mujer divorciada, Karenin sabía que iría a reunirse con Vronsky en unas relaciones ilícitas y antirreligiosas, porque para la mujer, según la religión, no puede haber otro esposo mientras el primero vive.