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I have a paralyzing fear of snakes.

I've only seen one snake out in the wilderness, not behind glass, and I froze. I literally couldn't move. So to say I have a fear of snakes would be true.

There is poison in the fang of the serpent, in the mouth of the fly and in the sting of a scorpion; but the wicked man is saturated with it.

I have often had apparitions of hosts of serpents with heads at their tails, but not one was able to bite me; and many other visions.

I have written a lot about snakes. There's something pretty primordial about it.

In neurotics, worm phobias are usually found as well as snake phobias.

People speak of the fear of the blank canvas as though it is a temporary hesitation, a trembling moment of self-doubt. For me it was more like being abducted from my bed by a clown, thrust into a circus arena with a wicker chair, and told to tame a pissed-off lion in front of an expectant crowd.

Terror works like a musical composition, so many instruments, all in tune, playing perfectly together to create their desired effect. Sorrow and horror and fear.

It is the mass dream of inverted self, populous with fears overt and secret, that forms the continuous but gossamer thread upon which are strung as phantom beads all civilizations from the remotest past of record to that of the present day and hour.

What terrified me will terrify others; and I need only describe the spectre which had haunted my midnight pillow.