Attentive to the law of universal love, this disciple of Ismael was reincarnated on 29 August 1831, in the small Riacho do Sangue, in the state of Ceará, son of Antônio Bezerra de Menezes, captain of the old militias and then lieutenant-colonel of the National Guard, and of Fabiana de Jesús Maria Bezerra. 

Antônio Bezerra was an important local landowner who "never measured sacrifices when it came to helping those who reached out to him". Such generosity eventually led to his material fortune and, at a certain point, to huge debts, which reached unbearable levels. 

Antônio then went to find each of his creditors, determined to hand over his assets to pay off the debts. The creditors, however, met and decided that Colonel Bezerra would continue with his assets. They signed a document stating with legal force that old Bezerra could keep them and "enjoy them and pay as and when he wished, and that they, the creditors, would be subject to any damages that might be incurred". Old Bezerra, however, did not accept such a decision. After much discussion, he resolved that from that date onwards he would simply be an administrator of the assets for his creditors. He withdrew only what was extremely necessary for the support of the family and was often deprived. 

At that point, the couple's last child, Adolfo, was already finishing the so-called preparatory course. The two older sons had already studied law and the third was still in his second year at the Law School in Olinda, Pernambuco. 

Little Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes was seven years old when he was taken by his mother to be enrolled in the public school of Vila do Frade. In ten months the boy learned to read, write and do simple arithmetic. Four years later, when the father was being targeted for political persecution, the family moved to Rio Grande do Norte. Little Adolfo "was enrolled in the public Latin class, which operated in Serra de Martins and was run by Jesuit priests" in Maioridade, today the city of Imperatriz. After two years, the boy became so good at the subject that he came to replace the teacher. 

At the age of 25, he received his doctorate from the Faculty of Medicine. 

In 1846, old Bezerra returned to the capital of Ceará, where little Adolfo was enrolled in the Lyceum, which was run by his older brother. When he finished his studies, he wanted to become a doctor, and not a lawyer like his brothers. As there was no medical school in the Northeast of the country, his father was forced to send him to the then seat of the Court, the city of Rio de Janeiro. He then told him everything that had happened to the family's assets, explaining the poverty they were experiencing. The relatives got together and raised four hundred thousand reais to pay for the trip to Rio. It was thus that Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes was able to take the ship and reach the then seat of the Empire. 

The young Adolfo settled in a boarding house, and it was with great difficulty that he managed to achieve his aim, because he suffered many difficulties to pay for his accommodation and had to provide some services to keep the rent up to date. However, he remained firm in his purpose, continued his studies and managed to achieve his goal, realising his dream of becoming a doctor. 

At the age of 22, he joined the Hospital de la Santa Casa de Misericordia as a trainee intern. At the age of 25, in 1856, he obtained his doctorate from the Faculty of Medicine of Rio de Janeiro, defending the thesis "Diagnosis of Cancer". At that time he abandoned the last patronymic, signing only Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes. 

As he did not have the money to set up a practice, he made an agreement with a fellow student who had more resources and divided up a room in the city's shopping centre. During the months that the practice was open, there were hardly any patients. But the house where Dr. Bezerra lived was full of patients. He began to treat family members and then friends. His fame spread through the neighbourhood and, with that, clients appeared; but nobody paid, as they were all poor people and money was never mentioned. 

It was then that a friend and military doctor, Dr. Manoel Feliciano Pereira de Carvalho, head of the Army Health Corps, decided to hire him as a military doctor. Dr. Feliciano was head of the surgical clinic of the Hospital da Misericórdia, a hospital where Dr. Bezerra had been a trainee and intern in 1852, when he was still in his second year of university. 

How Dr Bezerra saw the role of a physician 

In 1856, the imperial government reformed the Army Health Corps and appointed Dr. Feliciano as surgeon. He, then, called Bezerra to be his assistant and it was thus that, with a stable paid job, the path of the doctor of the poor began. Adolfo Bezerra de Menezes continued to treat for free those who could not pay. His fame continued to spread and his practice in the city centre began to become busy and frequented by paying clients. The money he received from the practice was spent with the poor on medicines, clothes and also, many times, cash assistance. 

The doctor of the poor had the function of a doctor in the highest sense of the word. 

He said: 

"A doctor does not have the right to finish a meal, nor to ask whether it is far or near, when any afflicted person knocks at the door. He who does not come because he is with visitors, because he has worked hard and is tired, or because it is late at night, the road or the weather is bad, or because he is far away or on the edge, or who, above all, asks for a car from someone who has nothing to pay for the prescription, or tells someone who cries at the door to find another - he is not a doctor, he is a medical merchant, who works to collect capital and interest on the cost of graduation. He is a wretch, who sends for someone else the angel of charity who came to visit him and brought him the only basket that could quench his spirit's thirst for wealth, the only one that will never be lost in the ups and downs of life". 

With his life more organised, he decided to get married. He met his love in the person of D. Maria Cândida Lacerda and they were married on November 6, 1858. At that time, Dr. Bezerra had a stable social position: besides being a doctor, he was a journalist and wrote for the main newspapers of the city; and in the military environment he was very respected. 

It didn't take long before he was offered a place on a party's plaque for the lessons of the legislative branch. 

Why Dr. Bezerra resigned from military career 

D. Maria, his wife, was one of the main promoters of Bezerra de Menezes' candidacy. The inhabitants of Sôn Cristóvão, the neighbourhood where he lived and attended, also wanted to have him as a representative in the Municipal Chamber. Thus, in 1860, Dr. Bezerra decided to run for a group from Sôn Cristóvão. An attempt was made to challenge his diploma under the pretext that a military man could not be elected. Bezerra then had to choose between a military career and politics. Following his wife's advice, he renounced the military patent and embraced political life at once. 

Fate, however, had a difficult test in store for him in 1863. After a sudden and rapid illness, his wife passed away in less than twenty days, leaving her husband with two children, one three years old and the other one year old. 

The shock of unexpected widowhood stirred the religious feelings that grief always brings to the fore. In search of solace, Dr. Bezerra went on to read the Bible often. He verified the vertical expansion that grief offers to the souls of the suffering, connecting them to God. 

At that time, the Spiritism was spreading throughout the world. In 1869 Allan Kardec disincarnated in Paris, consolidating for humanity the spiritist codification. Kardec's ideas were revolutionary and attracted the attention of researchers and scientists in all corners of the world. With the Codifier disincarnated, it remained for the work to recruit new spiritists. 

In Brazil, especially in the capital, the city of Sôn Sebastião de Rio de Janeiro, the European influences were very strong. Homeopathy soon became popular, mainly in spiritist circles, and one of its first experimenters was the bulwark of the Republic, José Bonifácio de Andrada e Silva, who corresponded to Hahnemann, the creator of homeopathy. As a doctor, the discussions on homeopathic therapeutics also interested Dr. Bezerra de Menezes and news of cures credited to this therapeutics reached his ears. 

Dr. Carlos Travassos had undertaken the first translation of Allan Kardec's works and had successfully completed the Portuguese version of the ‘’The Spirits‘ Book’'. 

How Dr. Bezerra came to know the Spiritist doctrine 

After the book came off the press, he took a copy to the deputy Bezerra de Menezes, handing it to him with a dedication. The episode was described as follows by the future Doctor of the Poor: 

"He gave it to me in the city and I lived in Tijuca, an hour's tram ride away. I boarded with the book and, as I had no distraction for the long journey, I said to myself: ‘Now, goodbye! I will not go to hell for reading this... Afterwards, it is ridiculous to confess myself ignorant of this philosophy, when I have studied all the philosophical schools. Thinking like that, I opened the book and I got attached to it, as I had done with the Bible. I read. But I found nothing that was new to my spirit, and yet it was all new to me!... I had already read or heard all that was in "The Spirits’ Book". I was seriously concerned with this marvellous fact, and I said to myself: it seems that I was an unconscious spiritist, or, as they say vulgarly, a born one". 

The Spiritism spread, helped a lot by the practices of homeopathic and spiritist doctors, who started to give charity also through their mediumship. One of these doctors was João Gonçalves do Nacimento and many of Bezerra de Menezes' companions spoke of the cures performed through this medium. And they talked so much that one day Bezerra decided to ask him for a prescription by sending a piece of paper that said only: "Adolfo, so many years, resident in Tijuca". It didn't take long and he received a reply with the correct diagnosis of his stomach problem. 

Dr. Bezerra was so impressed with the accuracy of his diagnosis that he decided to order prescriptions also for people with psychic problems - insanity was one of the areas Dr. Bezerra studied the most. 

He followed the development of treatment in his patients and, after simply attending the desobsessional work, resolved to take an active part in this type of treatment. In the view of Spiritist Doctrine, carriers of psychic illnesses are people who may present mental problems due to biological causes detectable by human science and also due to the influence of spirits of disincarnates, who are also ill.