Two little girls, on their way home from Sunday school, were solemnly discussing the lesson. “Do you believe there is a devil?” asked one. “No,” said the other promptly. “It’s like Santa Claus: it’s your father.” – Nebelspalter (Zurich, Switzerland), quoted in The Literary Digest, Vol.106, 1930

One father is more than a hundred Schoolemasters. – George Herbert, Outlandish Proverbs, 1640

My father, when he went, made my childhood a gift of a half a century. – Antonio Porchia, Voces, 1943, translated from Spanish by W.S. Merwin