The problems of normativity and value, which are implicit in human action, occupy a central position in the Treatise of Philosophy by Marino Gentile. According to Gentile, the importance of understanding – a cognitive faculty that he distinguishes form reason – is fully evident when one tries to account for those aspects of human experience. This essay highlights and discusses the relation between understanding,the normativity of human action and moral value in Gentile’s Treatise. It also suggests that Gentile’s conclusions can offer an original contribution to current debates about moral realism, since they offer an unusual solution to the problem of the relationship between the scientific and the manifest images of the world.