A statement about a correlation is symmetrical while a statement about a causal relationship is asymmetrical. If being a male is positively correlated with being a smoker, being a smoker is also positively correlated with being male. But if smoking causes lung cancer it needn't be the case that lung cancer causes smoking. Correlations are about actual populations and are not lawlike. Causal relationships are lawlike in the sense that they are about hypothetical populations as well as actual populations.
Mere correlations pertain only to actual populations.
For example, there is a strong positive correlation between an increase in the number of sex education classes and an increase in the rate of gonorrhea. Suppose we conclude that increasing the number of sex education classes has caused the increase in the gonorrhea rate. The correlation might be accidental or coincidental. Increase in the national debt is positively correlated with an increase in the gonorrhea rate, but there is no causal connection. The relation might be spurious, both an increase in the number of sex education classes and an increase in the rate of gonorrhea being the effects of the same cause.