BOSELLI, LUIGI ANTONIO. - Priest, educator, b. at Genova in 1798, d. there in 1886. He came into contact with and was influenced by the leading Ligurian exponents of Jansenism, the abbés Degola and Descalzi; hence his ideas, openly professed, concerning the need for a profound reform of the Church, and his opposition to the temporal power of the Popes and to the definition of papal infallibility. He was also an ardent patriot. But he devoted the best years of his life to the care of the deaf-mute; first as a pupil of Fr. O. Assarotti (v.), then as his collaborator, and finally, from 1829, as his successor in the direction of the institute for the deaf-mute of Genova, to which he gave vigorous development, encouraged by Cardinals Lambruschini and Tadini and praised by Gregory XVI himself (letter of 9 May 1835).
Among his writings should be noted: Sui sordomuti, sulla loro istruzione ed il loro numero (Genova 1834); Osservazioni sull'insegnamento della grammatica del p. Assarotti (in Educatore primario, 3 [1847], pp. 32 ff., 481 ff., 609 ff.); Considerazioni religiose e civili intorno all'educazione dei sordomuti (Napoli 1856); Appello alla nazione e ai poteri dello Stato a favore dei sordomuti (Genova 1863).