Friendship is the only thing in the world concerning the usefulness of which all mankind are agreed.
Probability is the very guide of life.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Probability plays a crucial role in decision-making and understanding life's uncertainties.
Cicero’s quote highlights the significance of probability in navigating life’s complexities. It suggests that understanding and applying the principles of chance can aid individuals in making informed decisions, anticipating outcomes, and embracing the uncertainties inherent in life. This perspective calls attention to the importance of rational thinking and statistical reasoning as tools for guiding one’s actions and choices.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
During a speech on strategic planning, one might say, 'As Cicero said, probability is the very guide of life, which emphasizes the importance of assessing risks.'
More from Marcus Tullius Cicero
All quotes →Those wars are unjust which are undertaken without provocation. For only a war waged for revenge or defence can actually be just.
Orators are most vehement when their cause is weak.
Nothing contributes to the entertainment of the reader more, than the change of times and the vicissitudes of fortune.
No one has the right to be sorry for himself for a misfortune that strikes everyone.
Advice in old age is foolish; for what can be more absurd than to increase our provisions for the road the nearer we approach to our journey's end.
Similar quotes
When we enlarge our view of the world, we deepen our understanding of our own lives.
We remain more than a collection of red states and blue states. We are and forever will be the United States of America.
Human relations are impossible. When they are real they are uncomfortable, and when they are comfortable they are unreal. It was for the journey into solitude that the human soul was created.
Seeing the lightest and gayest purple was then most in fashion, he would always wear that which was the nearest black; and he would often go out of doors, after his morning meal, without either shoes or tunic; not that he sought vain-glory from such novelties, but he would accustom himself to be ashamed only of what deserves shame, and to despise all other sorts of disgrace.
When You Hold Onto Your History, You Do It At The Expense Of Your Destiny.
I never felt any attraction towards violence. I never tried to express myself through violence. Violence is a language.