We’ve gathered some of our favorite snake quotes to help you see the positive things that snakes can symbolize in our lives.
If you’re curious to find out more, then you should definitely go through this list.
At first glance, many people look at snakes as something to fear and something that evokes negative connotations like death, poison, and deception.
And while that may be true, snakes also have another side to them that may come in handy when it comes to our personal growth and development.
Read the full list below.
And make sure to check out these animal quotes and tiger quotes.
Best Snake Quotes
1. “Truth is as straight as an arrow, while a lie swivels like a snake.” – Suzy Kassem
2. “In addition, the body of a snake also resembles those marks with a stylus, brush, or pen that make up our letters.” – Boria Sax
3. “Every orchid, or rose, or lizard, or snake is the work of a dedicated and skilled breeder. There are thousands of people, amateurs and professionals, who devote their lives to this business.” – Freeman Dyson
4. “The snake stood up for evil in the Garden.” – Robert Frost
5. “Like a snake sheds its skin, we are capable of getting rid of assembled habits—creating space to call matters into question.” – Erik Pevernagie
6. “No, snakes are no problem. I’d go to any country, anywhere, any snakes, not a problem.” – Steve Irwin
7. “Fear is a tyrant and a despot, more terrible than the rack, more potent than the snake.” – Edgar Wallace
8. “The snake produces poison in its body to poison its enemies! But man is a strange snake; he produces poison in his mind to poison his fellow men!” – Mehmet Murat ildan
9. “If there is a snake in the grass, you have to set the field on fire to draw it out.” – Matshona Dhliwayo
Snake Quotes on Deception
10. “To the unspoiled, even a snake bite is a loving kiss. But to the spoiled, even a loving kiss is a snake bite.” – Mikhail Naimy
11. “I’d rather meander through a pit of vipers than love one more person, but since I’m on the subject of snakes, we all know one, or are one.” – Donna Lyn Hope
12. “Snakes hide in grass; people, behind their lies.” – nopain
13. “The snake grins through his fangs, admiring Eve’s playacting.” – Dave Mitchell
14. “We must enlist our own snake and strike like a cobra against their vitals with an attack on Washington.” – Robert E. Lee
15. “Sometimes, snakes can’t slough. They can’t burst their old skin. Then they go sick and die inside the old skin, and nobody ever sees the new pattern. It needs a real desperate recklessness to burst your old skin at last.” – D.H. Lawrence
16. “A snake in the grass is deadlier than a lion in a tree.” – Matshona Dhliwayo
17. “A snake will always be a snake, even if you put a chain around its neck and try to make it walk upright.” – Lisa Alther
18. “It’s good to see the snakes revealing themselves. They weren’t actually hidden at all. People hide behind the masks, but eventually you see them for who they truly are.” – Amaka Imani Nkosazana
19. “Propaganda is a soft weapon; hold it in your hands too long, and it will move about like a snake, and strike the other way.” – Jean Anoulih
Wise Snake Quotes
20. “Even if a snake is not poisonous, it should pretend to be venomous.” – Chanakya
21. “Always carry a flagon of whiskey in case of snakebite and furthermore always carry a small snake.” – W.C. Fields
22. “Not all the snakes are poisonous and not all the poisons are deadly! Keep this in mind when bitten.” – Mehmet Murat İldan
23. “Before me, a scholarly man of European culture, head of a literary department, and one of the great people who snake through the crowd, keep my head low.” – Julian Lennon
24. “Any man who is attached to things of this world is one who lives in ignorance and is being consumed by the snakes of his own passions.” – Black Elk
25. “There is something about snakes that is so wise—they have this uncanny perfection.” – Anton Szandor LaVey
26. “Instead of expending time to train yourself not to be afraid of snakes, avoid them altogether.” – Richard Koch
27. “Your life is like this snake’s coils. No matter how many turns it makes, you’ll end up back where you belong. With me.” – Maria V. Snyder
28. “Make sure you cut the grass low so the snakes show.” – Banky W.
29. “Snake’s poison is life to the snake; it is in relation to man that it means death.” – Rumi
30. “For every snake, there is a ladder; for every ladder, a snake.” – Salman Rushdie
31. “A snake knows more about what is happening around than any other creature, because it has no ears to listen to gossip—only direct perception.” – Jaggi Vasudev
32. “The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well, the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
33. “The crookedness of the serpent is still straight enough to slide through the snake hole.” – Abraham Verghese
34. “I suppose, I’m a snake. A liar. A deceiver. Cursed to crawl on my belly and eat dust all the days of my life.” – Shelby Mahurin
Snake Quotes on Personality
35. “I am like a snake who has already been bitten. I retreat from a direct battle while knowing the slow effect of the poison.” – Anais Nin
36. “I always wanted to be a snake. Every time I saw a snake on TV, I’d always say, ‘Why not me’’” – Dane Cook
37. “When you’re a snake charmer, you’re gonna get bit.” – LaVar Ball
38. “Were you always such a snake, or did you grow into what you are?” – Dean Koontz
39. “He was a poisonous snake, and I was another, and on such terms we pleased ourselves.” – Madeline Miller
40. “She snaps her fingers, and a large white snake drops from overhead and slinks its way around her shoulders. She often wears them like scarves.” – Breeana Shields
41. “The hearings are just like a snake about to devour people.” – Pat Nixon
42. “You were born with a snake in both of your fists while a hurricane was blowing.” – Bob Dylan
43. “A madness of tender caressing seized her. She purred as a tiger might have done, while she undulated like a snake.” – Elinor Glyn
44. “Just as a snake sheds its skin, we must shed our past over and over again.” – Gautama Buddha
45. “I’m a tiger when I want love, but I’m a snake if we disagree.” – Jethro Tull
46. “Like the snake sheds its skin living for a while in another one, man strips himself from opinions gathered up until a certain age, developing others.” – Mariana Fulger
47. “It was strange how she found out. One moment she didn’t know; the next minute she did. One moment her mind was as blank as the desert; the next minute the snake of suspicion had slithered into her thoughts and raised its poisonous head.” – Thrity Umrigar
48. “Snakes are just very instinctive to me. I’ve been playing with snakes since before I could walk. It doesn’t matter where or what it is, from the biggest to the most venomous.” – Steve Irwin
49. “When you’ve been around a snake long enough, you learn how to crawl in the dirt.” – Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Snake Quotes on Phobia and Fear
50. “I have a paralyzing fear of snakes.” – Kate Upton
51. “When you see a snake, never mind where he came from.” – William Gurney Benham
52. “We instinctively fear snakes, but we appear not to be afraid of fast cars, which are a real danger now. This suggests our emotions were shaped by our evolutionary environment, not the one we grew up in.” – Steven Pinker
53. “Have you ever held a snake? They are so strong. You can see why there are so many myths about them: they are unlike any other creature.” – Michelle Paver
54. “I hate and fear snakes, because if you look into the eyes of any snake you will see that it knows all and more of the mystery of man’s fall, and that it feels all the contempt that the Devil felt when Adam was evicted from Eden. Besides which its bite is generally fatal, and it twists up trouser legs.” – Rudyard Kipling
Snake Quotes That Will Inspire You
55. “Every great story seems to begin with a snake.” – Nicolas Cage
56. “I want to give up my bearings, slip out of who I am, shed everything, the way a snake discards old skin.” – Khaled Hosseini
57. “Even snakes are afraid of snakes.” – Steven Wright
58. “The world of men is dreaming, it has gone mad in its sleep, and a snake is strangling it, but it can’t wake up.” – D.H. Lawrence
59. “The snakes have their place in the agricultural economy of the village, but our villagers do not seem to realize it.” – Mahatma Gandhi
60. “Life’s full of tricky snakes and ladders.” – Steven Morissey
61. “Today, there’s more fellowship among snakes than among mankind. Wild beasts spare those with similar markings.” – Juvenal
62. “Life feels like a game of Snakes and Ladders, but without any ladders.” – David Moody
63. “Four snakes gliding up and down a hollow for no purpose that I could see—not to eat, not for love, but only gliding.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
64. “Have you ever studied a snake’s face? How optimistic they look. They have an eternal smile.” – Tasha Tudor
Interesting Snake Quotes
65. “Love hath made thee a tame snake.” – William Shakespeare
66. “It’s so bizarre. I’m not scared of snakes or spiders, but I’m scared of butterflies. There is something eerie about them. Something weird!” – Nicole Kidman
67. “I really think I like poisonous snakes.” – Bindi Irwin
68. “‘People get bitten. But I won’t.’ I found myself saying, ‘You will, you will. These snakes don’t know you find death inconceivable. They don’t know you’re young and strong and you think death applies to everyone but you. They will bite you and you will die.’” – Don DeLillo
69. “Loneliness is like a hiss of a snake, ambushed. It‘s horrific and horrible. The sound of the hidden menace spoils your peace of mind and is panicking enough to make you taste death before dying.” – Mubashar Nawaz & Khurram Shahzad
70. “He left the sarai with the urgency of a snake that must slough out of its skin. The noon air outside wrapped him like the warm embrace of a friend.” – Mukta Singh-Zocchi
71. “The older a wizard grows, the more silent he becomes, like a woody vine growing over time to choke a garden path, deep and full of moss and snakes, running everywhere, impenetrable.” – F.T. McKinstry
72. “Ah, come now. I look like an angel, but I’m not. The old rules of nature encompass many creatures like me. We’re beautiful like the diamond-backed snake, or the striped tiger, yet we’re merciless killers.” – Anne Rice
73. “St. Patrick was a terror to any snake that came in his path, whether it was the cold, slimy reptile sliding along the ground or the more dangerous snake that oppresses men through false teachings. And he drove the snakes out of the minds of men, snakes of superstition and brutality and cruelty.” – Arthur Brisbane
74. “I’m not scared of snakes, spiders, or heights. I have three children; as a mum, you can’t be afraid of things like that.” – Britt Ekland
Insightful Snake Quotes
75. “When the snake decided to go straight, he didn’t get anywhere.” – William Stafford
76. “When the sleeping snake is gone, then you can rest at ease.” – Gautama Buddha
77. “Snakes move like earth-fish inside a mountain, well away from seawater. Certain sunfish, though, turn snakes into ocean lovers.” – Rumi
78. “As the snake is separate from its slough, even so is the spirit separate from the body.” – Ramakrishna
79. “The kundalini energy is often compared to a snake that is coiled up. Because it is coiled up, it can spring very quickly. It can jump and extend itself very far.” – Frederick Lenz
80. “The snake will always bite back.” – Jake Roberts
81. “Once bitten by a snake, he is scared all his life at the mere sight of a rope.” – Anonymous
82. “A man does not run among thorns for no reason; either he is chasing a snake or a snake is chasing him.” – Anonymous
83. “Look before you leap, for snakes among sweet flowers do creep.” – Anonymous
84. “Striking a snake with a short stake is a mistake. Instead, take a long rake and break its head, if it quakes or shakes, strike again and again till it can’t wake to make trouble.” – Vincent Okay Nwachukwu
85. “Your body is not who you are. You shed it like a snake sheds its skin. Leave it, forgotten, behind you.” – Altered Carbon
86. “I could see the bird soaring away. And then I realized there was no more shutting of your eyes to the truth, no salvation in being blindfolded, no dream and reality, no being awake or asleep. Everything is one and the same continuing eternal day and world, coiling around you like a snake. This is when I saw vast, remote happiness as being small but close.” – Milorad Pavić
87. “I have one phobia—snakes. And by snakes, I mean intimacy.” – Dana Gould
88. “It isn’t true that the laws of nature have been capriciously disturbed; that snakes have talked; that women have been turned into salt; that rods have brought water out of rocks.” – Arthur Conan Doyle
89. “A story can fly like a bee, so straight and swift you catch only the hum of its passing. Or move so slowly it seems motionless, curled in upon itself like a snake in the sun. It can vanish like smoke before the wind. Linger like perfume in the nose. Change with every telling, yet always remain the same.” – Cameron Dokey
Short and Straight to the Point Snake Quotes
90. “If you want to kill a snake, chop off its head.” – Anonymous
91. “Don’t create snakes out of ropes. You have enough to worry about.” – Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
92. “When you chop off a snake’s head, all you are left with is a piece of rope.” – Anonymous
93. “Snakes, after all, have a great sense of decorum and order.” – Silvia Moreno-Garcia
94. “Use your enemy’s hand to catch a snake.” – Anonymous
95. “Dragons and snakes aren’t so different.” – A.D. Aliwat
96. “A snake deserves no pity.” – Anonymous
97. “I would pay snakes to bite her.” – Chuck Palahniuk
98. “When the snake is in the house, one need not discuss the matter at length.” – Anonymous
99. “Seen some friends who turned into snakes.” – Jordan Hoechlin
Snake Quotes on Life and the People Around Us
100. “Remember, it is not the snake bite that kills, but the venom which circulates afterwards that is fatal. Do not let the snake bite of another person release any venom inside of you. You can control its entry and you are responsible for every thought in your mind.” – Robin Sharma
101. “My success symbolizes loyalty, great friends, dedication, and hard work. Routine builds character in a world full of snakes, rats and scavengers.” – Nas
102. “Sometimes, when we’re feeling sad, it’s important just to feel the sadness. Like a snake shedding its skin, old feelings of remorse and regret and hurt and anger often have to come up in order to be released. On the other side we’re a better person, capable of a happier life—who we are when we’re no longer burdened by the buried feelings that weighed us down, or the self-defeating patterns that the pain produced.” – Marianne Williamson
103. “A person whose heart is not content is like a snake which tries to swallow an elephant.” – Anonymous
104. “If a rich man ate a snake, they would say it was because of his wisdom; if a poor man ate it, they would say it was because of his stupidity.” – Anonymous
105. “Emotional baggage is like the dead skin of a snake. If you don’t shed it, how can you grow emotionally?” – Khang Kijarro Nguyen
106. “Only dangerous things can tell you how dangerous the world you live in! If you focus on innocent lambs, you get a wrong idea about this universe! Focus on poisonous snakes if you want to progress in the art of existence in this universe!” – Mehmet Murat ildan
107. “Round and round they went with their snakes, snakily.” – Aldous Huxley
108. “The voices inside her head had awakened from their peace as they hissed in whisper through her ears. They slithered inside Sophia’s mind and through her thoughts, entrancing her under a spell of anxiety, spilling all of her worries that she had stored away.” – Arti Manani
109. “Woman is a misbegotten man and has a faulty and defective nature in comparison to his. Therefore, she is unsure of herself. What she cannot get, she seeks to obtain through lying and diabolical deceptions. And so, to put it briefly, one must be on one’s guard with every woman, as if she were a poisonous snake and the horned devil.” – Albertus Magnus
110. “She knew herself, how she had slowly, over years, become a cat, a wolf, a snake, anything but a girl. How she had wrung out her girlhood like death.” – Catherynne M. Valente
111. “Death consists, indeed, in a repeated process of unrobing, or unsheathing. The immortal part of man shakes off from itself, one after the other, its outer casings, and as the snake from its skin, the butterfly from its chrysalis emerges from one after another, passing into a higher state of consciousness.” – Annie Besant
112. “Maybe it’s animalness that will make the world right again—the wisdom of elephants, the enthusiasm of canines, the grace of snakes, the mildness of anteaters. Perhaps being human needs some diluting.” – Carol Emshwiller
113. “To be crazy is not necessarily to writhe in snake pits or converse with imaginary gods. It can sometimes be not knowing what to do in the morning.” – Christopher Lehmann-Haupt
114. “If you see a snake, just kill it—don’t appoint a committee on snakes.” – Ross Perot
Snake Quotes That Will Make You Laugh
115. “Snakes have no arms. That’s why they don’t wear vests.” – Steven Wright
116. “Well, yeah, you listen to a talking snake and there’s gonna be trouble.” – Mike Magnolia
117. “Rocking the campaign trail, it’s President Snakes. She is giving speeches and a lot of handshakes. She runs a clean campaign, that ol’ President Snakes.” – The Doubleclicks
118. “What is with these guys? Where’s the thrill in watching snakes eat? I certainly didn’t thrill in watching humans eat.” – Patrick Jennings
119. “The snake in the fence is now inside the lungi.” – Sidin Vadukut
120. “I’m like a snake sleeping on a rock. I won’t bother you unless you poke a stick at me.” – Harlan Ellison
121. “Hot weather brings out snakes and slaveholders, and I like one class of the venomous creatures as little as I do the other.” – Harriet Ann Jacobs
122. “You can’t talk of the dangers of snake poisoning and not mention snakes.” – C. Everett Koop
123. “When a woman teams up with a snake, a moral storm threatens somewhere.” – Stacy Schiff
124. “There is no way to catch a snake that is as safe as not catching him.” – Jacob Braude
125. “I shaved this morning for precisely that reason. I was like, ‘Well, you never know when someone is going to clamp down on your calf and try to suck out the snake poison.’” – John Green
126. “Snakes do not hiss anymore; they call you ‘babe,’ ‘bro,’ or ‘friend.’ It is getting harder and harder to find someone that you can actually trust in this world. So many people in this world couldn’t care less about things such as character, honor, integrity, respect, or honesty.” – rasarb
127. “We were going for cake with—wait for it—a six-foot snake.” – Cindy Callaghan
128. “I’m after a snake, and please, God, I’ll scotch it.” – Adam Hochschild
129. “My favorite moments? Where it’s all going swimmingly, the sun’s out and I’ve got a fire going and a nice snake on the barbecue.” – Bear Grylls
Famous Snake Quotes From Movies and Books
130. “I am the jungle’s eyes. I can see the past, and the future. It is I, Kaa, who witnessed the coming of man.” – Kaa
131. “Hope is never a foolish thing, although others will tell you it is.” – Mrs. Plithiver
132. “Trust me, my pungent friend, you’ll get what’s coming to you. My life is but to serve you, my Lord.” – Jafar
133. “He knows what you were born, not who you are.” – Nagini
134. “I knew it! I knew this would happen! I tried to warn you, but no, no, no, you wouldn’t listen. You just had to.” – Sir Hiss
135. “Oh. Oh my gosh! I’m a snake!” – Viper
136. “It was as if the room beyond the blast furnace was a tub and someone had turned the faucets on the cold and hot running snakes.” – Joe Hill
137. “Asssssssssssmodeusssss! Come with me, young foxie, I will show you eternity.” – Asmodeus
138. “The mongoose I want under the stairs when the snakes slither by.” – Hannibal
139. “There is a pair of snakes who have learned to drive a car so recklessly that they would run you over in the street and never stop to apologize.” – Lemony Snicket
140. “No owl is afraid of the night, no snake of the swamp, and no traitor of treason!” – Mehmet Murat İldan
141. “If you’re listening to this, congratulations! You survived Doomsday. I’d like to apologize straightaway for any inconvenience the end of the world may have caused you. The earthquakes, rebellions, riots,tornadoes, floods, tsunamis, and of course the giant snake who swallowed the sun—I’m afraid most of that was our fault.” – Rick Riordan
142. “I’m not the one who’s so far away when I feel the snake bite enter my veins. Never did I wanna be here again, and I don’t remember why I came.” – Sully Erna
143. “I am working on a new book about a boa constrictor and a litter of hyenas. The boa constrictor swallows the babies one by one, and the mother hyena dies laughing.” – E.B. White
144. “I know who I am. No one else knows who I am. If I was a giraffe, and someone said I was a snake. I’d think, no, actually I’m a giraffe.” – Richard Gere
Quotes That Will Tell You More About Snakes
145. “Snakes can have dozens of young at a time, and so they are often symbols of fertility.” – Boria Sax
146. “The snake kills by squeezing very slowly. This is how the civilized world slowly, slowly pushes into the forest and takes away the world that used to be.” – James Cameron
147. “My hike up the Snake Path at Masada was mystical. The fog rolled in, enveloping the entire mountain.” – Richard Edelman
148. “Snakes are sometimes perceived as evil, but they are also perceived as medicine. If you look at an ambulance, there’s the two snakes on the side of the ambulance. The caduceus, or the staff of Hermes, there’s the two snakes going up it, which means that the venom can also be healing.” – Nicolas Cage
149. “The snake was on top of the bags, and he was starting to move around inside the container because he could see where the heat was coming from, and that’s where he wanted to get.” – Jim Thompson
150. “A lot of snake bites occur purely out of reaction. If someone picks up a rock or piece of wood a snake is laying under, the snake could strike out of defense.” – Fred Rainwater
151. “Poison—the perfect weapon for a snake.” – Suzanne Collins
152. “Since all snakes appreciate jewels, precious metals, and mirrors. Their vanity causes them to spend many minutes chasing their reflection in their surfaces, but one must not think poorly of snakes for this reason, since they are kind, thoughtful creatures.” – Silvia Moreno-Garcia
153. “Well, it’s a lot less dangerous, working with snakes and mountain lions and dangerous animals, than working in Hollywood. Hollywood will kill you.” – Bernie Krause
154. “You never die from a snake bite. You can’t be unbitten; it’s in the way, what continues to pour through you long after the bite has taken place.” – Bob Proctor
155. “Never wound a snake; kill it.” – Harriet Tubman
156. “Kill the snake of doubt in your soul, crush the worms of fear in your heart, and mountains will move out of your way.” – Kate Seredy
157. “I’m like Loki in Nordic mythology—one day I’ll be a woman and the next day a snake.” – Yung Lean
158. “There’s a snake lurking in the grass.” – Virgil
159. “Don’t touch me, I’m full of snakes.” – Jack Kerouac
More Snake Quotes That’ll Interest You
160. “Self-love forever creeps out, like a snake, to sting anything which happens to stumble upon it.” – Lord Byron
161 “The relationship with a snake is not like what we have with dogs, like how we can sort of cuddle a dog.” – Danny Green
162. “You know, you can touch a stick of dynamite. But if you touch a venomous snake, it’ll turn around and bite you and kill you so fast it’s not even funny.” – Steve Irwin
163. “I’d like to make it very clear that getting bitten by a venomous snake is dumb, clumsy, and nothing to be proud of.” – Romulus Whitaker
164. “Sin penetrates to the heart, darkens and hardens it until it extinguishes the light of belief. Each sin has a path that leads to unbelief. Unless that sin is swiftly obliterated by seeking God’s forgiveness, it grows from a worm into a snake that gnaws at the heart.” – Said Nursi
165. “Owing to ignorance of the rope, the rope appears to be a snake; owing to ignorance of the self, the transient state arises of the individualized, limited, phenomenal aspect of the self.” – Guru Nanak
166. “Everybody has ways in which they’ve been lucky in life, and everybody also has ways in which they’ve definitely rolled snake eyes.” – Tana French
167. “An indigo snake leaves a lasting impression.” – Padget Powell
168. “Everyone must imagine his own snakes because no one else’s snakes can ever be as awful.” – Tove Jansson
169. “Thy words are like a cloud of winged snakes.” – Percy Bysshe Shelley
170. “Marriage is like putting your hand into a bag of snakes in the hope of pulling out an eel.” – Leonardo da Vinci
Did These Snake Quotes Shed Light On the Positive Things That Snakes Can Symbolize?
Though snakes are usually equated with death, destruction, and evil, as depicted in many films and books, they are also a symbol for fertility and rebirth. Like how they shed skin multiple times in life, we also have to shed off the things that weigh us down. Our emotional problems, our bad habits, our immoral thoughts—all these things are like the snake’s skin that we need to get rid off in order for us to grow into better human beings.
What do you think about snakes? Do you believe that they can help you evolve and become better human beings through these quotes? Let us know what you think. Comment your thoughts down below.
