This final chapter is a retrospective look at the contents of the earlier chapters
from the viewpoints of five desires that people often hold in relation to their
conceptions of moral development. The desires are (a) for immanent justice, (b)
to understand the causes of the consequences that result from people's behavior
in moral situations, (c) to become immortal, (d) to enjoy a happy life, and (e) to
understand the moral-development process in order to help others who need moral
guidance.

The desire to have life operate on a principle of immanent justice has been
widely held over the centuries. Belief in immanent justice is the expectation--or
at least the hope--that the universe, by its very nature, will ensure that
wrongdoing is punished and virtue prevails. Such a desire is reflected in the
notion of just deserts--that people will inevitably experience consequences
appropriate to the moral rectitude of their acts. In legal circles that desire appears
as the talionic principle (lex talionis), which holds that an inflicted punishment
should correspond in both degree and kind to the transgressor's offense. The
best-known statement of lex talionis is the biblical injunction:

And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth
for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound,
stripe for stripe. (Holy Bible, 1611, Exodus, 21:23-25).

Within certain belief systems, immanent justice is not merely a hope or
desire, but is offered as an authentic description of how the world really operates.
In the New Testament of the Christian Bible, the apostle Paul warned that
people's deeds attract fitting consequences: "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall
he also reap" (Holy Bible, 1611, Galatians 6:7). In Chaucer Canterbury

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