Gioberti Vincenzo (1801–52), Italian philosopher and statesman. He was an ordained priest, was imprisoned and exiled for advocating Italian unification, and became a central political figure during the Risorgimento. His major political work, Del primato morale e civile degli Italiani (‘On the Moral and Civil Primacy of Italians,’ 1843), argues for a federation of the Italian states with the pope as its leader. Gioberti’s philosophical theory, ontologism, in contrast to Hegel’s idealism, identifies the dialectics of Being with God’s creation. He condensed his theory in the formula: ‘Being creates the existent.’ The dialectics of Being, which is the only necessary substance, is a palingenesis, or a return to its origin, in which the existent first departs from and imitates its creator (mimesis), and then returns to its creator (methexis). By intuition, the human mind comes in contact with God and discovers truth by retracing the dialectics of Being. However, knowledge of supernatural truths is given only by God’s revelation (Teorica del soprannaturale [‘Theory of the Supernatural,’ 1838] and Introduzione allo studio della filosofia [‘Introduction to the Study of Philosophy,’ 1841]). Gioberti criticized modern philosophers such as Descartes for their psychologism – seeking truth from the human subject instead of from Being itself and its revelation. His thought is still influential in Italy, especially in Christian spiritualism. P.Gar.