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"The dice of Zeus fall ever luckily"
- Sophocles (497-406/5 B.C.) (Phædra Fragment 809)
"God’s dice always have a lucky roll"
- Sophocles (497-406/5 B.C.) (Fragments 1, 763)

"Alea jacta est" (The die is cast)
- Julius Caesar (January 10, 49 BC)

"Metheglin, wort, and malmsey: well run, dice!"
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("Love's Labour's Lost" Act V Scene II (1598))
"Be these the wretches that we play’d at dice for?"
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("Henry the Fifth"  Act IV Scene V (1600))
"Do the low-rated English play at dice;"
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("Henry the Fifth"  Act IV Chorus (1600))
"If Hercules and Lichas play at dice
Which is the better man, the greater throw
May turn by fortune from the weaker hand:"
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("The Merchant of Venice" Act II Scene I (1600))
"Indeed, my lord, he lent it me awhile; and I gave him use for it, a double heart for a single one:
marry, once before he won it of me with false dice, therefore your Grace may well say I have lost it."
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("Much Ado about Nothing" Act II Scene I (1600))
"Keep a gamester from the dice, and a good student from his book, and it is wonderful."
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("The Merry Wives of Winsor" Act III Scene I (1602))
"Wine lov’d I dearly, dice dearly; and in woman out-paramour’d the Turk:"
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("King Lear" Act III Scene IV (1608))
"He hath spoken true; the very dice obey him."
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("Antony and Cleopatra" Act II Scene III (1623))
"...As dice are to be wish’d by one that fixes ..."
- William Shakespeare (1564–1616)  ("The Winter's Tale" Act I Scene II (1623))

"To thee, fair Freedom! I retire
From flattery, cards, and dice, and din:
Nor art thou found in mansions higher
Than the low cot, or humble inn.

‘Tis here with boundless pow’r I reign;
And ev’ry health which I begin
Converts dull port to bright champagne;
Such Freedom crowns it, at an inn."
- William Shenstone (1714–1763)

"The world is the house of the strong.
I shall not know until the end what I have lost or won in this place,
in this vast gambling den where I have spent more than sixty years,
dicebox in hand, shaking the dice."
- Denis Diderot (1713–1784) (Elements of Physiology, “Conclusion,” (1774-1780))

"I have a notion that gamblers are as happy as most people,
being always excited; women, wine, fame, the table, even ambition, sate now & then,
but every turn of the card & cast of the dice keeps the gambler alive
-besides one can game ten times longer than one can do any thing else."
- Lord Byron (1788-1824) ("Detached Thoughts, no. 33" (1821-1822))

"Whose game was empires and whose stakes were thrones,
Whose table earth, whose dice were human bones."
  - Lord Byron (1788-1824) ("Age of Bronze" Stanza 3 (1823))

"The dice of God are always loaded"
 - Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) (“Compensation,” Essays, First Series (1841))
"The first steps in Agriculture, Astronomy, Zoölogy
(those first steps which the farmer, the hunter, and the sailor take),
teach that nature’s dice are always loaded;
that in her heaps and rubbish are concealed sure and useful results."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) ("Nature" 1836, revised and repr. 1849)

"The gold-digger in the ravines of the mountains is as much a gambler as his fellow in the saloons of San Francisco.
What difference does it make whether you shake dirt or shake dice? If you win, society is the loser."
- Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) (“Life Without Principle” (1863))

"Give me today, for once, the worst throw of your dice, destiny. Today I transmute everything into gold."
- Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) (Unpublished fragments dating to November 1882 - February 1883)

"Appeal. In law, to put the dice into the box for another throw."
- Ambrose Bierce ("The Devil’s Dictionary" (1881-1906))

"Often beneath the wave, wide from this ledge
The dice of drowned men’s bones he saw bequeath
An embassy."
 - Hart Crane (1899–1932)

"I shall never believe that God plays dice with the world"
- Albert Einstein ("Einstein, His Life and Times", Philipp Frank (1947))
"God does not play dice [with the universe"
- Albert Einstein (Quoted by Banesh Hoffman in "Albert Einstein")

"Thence, flow! conceit and motion to rehearse
Pastoral terrors of youth still in the man,
Torsions of sleep, in emblematic verse
Rattling like dice unless the verse shall scan
All chance away...."
- Allen Tate (1899–1979) (“The Maimed Man” (1952))

"Yeah? It also happens that people win with loaded dice. "
- Marlin Brando (as Sky Masterson in "Guys and Dolls" (1955))
and MANY other references including the song "Luck be a Lady"

"Surely the day will come when color means nothing more than skin tone,
when religion is seen uniquely as a way to speak one’s soul;
when birth places have the weight of a throw of the dice
and all men are born free, when understanding breeds love and brotherhood."
- Josephine Baker (1906–1975) (1963)

"You got to roll me and call me the tumblin',
Roll me and call me the tumblin' dice."
- Rolling Stones ("Tumblin' Dice" Album: Exile on Mainstreet (1972))

"Just go on and roll the dice
"You only live twice
so do it or die."
- Atlanta Rhythm Section ("Do It Or Die" Album: Underdog (1979))

"The gods may throw the dice
Their minds as cold as ice.
And someone way down here
Loses someone dear.”
- ABBA ( "Winner Takes It All" Album: Super Trouper (1980))

"Everybody knows that the dice are loaded"
- Leonard Cohen ("Everybody Knows" Album : I'm Your Man (1988))

"Roll the dice behind your shades"
  - Paul Westerberg ("Dice Behind Your Shades" Album: 14 Songs (1993))

"When everyday is a risk ... cards and dice are not as interesting as they used to be"
- Lando Molari ("Darkness Ascending" Babylon 5 (June 3 1998))

"Roll them high
Throw them again
All Gods’ dice"
- Pearl Jam ("God's Dice" Album: Binaural (2000))

"Oft have I played at cards and dice,
Because they were so enticing;
But this is a sad and sorrowful day
To see my apron rising."
- Unknown Author (The Rantin Laddie)

"When God throws the dice are loaded" - Greek Proverb

"Never play dice with a guy named Bones" - unknown

"We may throw the dice, but the LORD determines how they fall." - Proverbs 16:33

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