He graduated at the university of hard knocks and during his short life took several post-graduate courses. He had been wage-earner, printer's-devil, printer, pressman, editor. He knew the world of men, the struggling, sorrowing, hoping, laughing, sinning world of men. And to those whom God had tempted beyond what they could bear, his heart went out. He read books with profit, and got great panoramic views out into the world of art and poetry; dreaming dreams and sending his swaying filament of thought out and out, hoping it would somewhere catch and he would be in communication with another world. Discreet and cautious little men are known by the company they keep. The fool was not particular about his associates; children, sick people, insane folks, rich or poor --it made no difference to him. He sometimes even sat at meat with publicans and sinners. He was a mystic and lived in the ideal. This deeply religious quality in his nature led him into theology, and he became a clergyman--a Baptist clergyman. But no church is large enough to hold such a man as this; the fool quality in his nature outcrops, and the jingle of bells makes sleep to the chief pew-holder impossible. So the fool had to go. Then he founded that unique periodical, which, in three years, attained a circulation of 90,000 copies. This paper was not used for pantry shelves, lamp lighters, or other base utilitarian purposes. It cost ten times as much as a common newspaper, and the people who bought it read it until it was worn out. All the things in this paper were not truth; mixed up amid a world of wit were often extravagance and much bad taste. It was only a fool's newspaper! In this periodical the fool railed and jeered and stated facts about smirking complacency, facts so terrible that folks said they were indecent. He flung his jibes at stupidity, and stupidity sought to answer criticism by assassination. Texas has a libel law patterned after the libel law of the State of New York. If a man takes from you your good name you can put him behind prison bars and place shutters over the windows of his place of business. The people who thought Brann had injured them did not invoke the law. They invoked Judge Lynch---- A mob seized the fool, and, placing a rope about his neck, led him naked through the October night, out to the theological seminary, which they declared he had traduced. There they smote him with the flat of their hands, and spat upon him. It was their intention to hang the fool, but better counsel prevailed, and on his signing, in terrorem, a document they placed before him, they gave him warning to depart to another state. And on his promising to do so, they let him go. But the next day he refused to leave; and his flashing wit still filled the air, now embittered through the outrage visited upon him.