Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, has God said, you shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
All Commentaries on Genesis 3:1 Go To Genesis 3
Ambrose of Milan
AD 397
Since every creature is subject to passion, lust stole into man’s affection with the stealth of a serpent. Moses was quite right in representing pleasure in the likeness of a serpent. Pleasure is prone on its belly like a serpent, not walking on feet or raised on legs. It glides along, so to speak, with the slippery folded curves of its whole body. Earth is its food, as it is the serpent’s, for it has no comprehension of heavenly food. It feeds on things of the body, and it is changed into many sorts of pleasures and bends to and fro in twisting wreathes. It has venom in its fangs, and with these the dissolute individual is disemboweled, the glutton destroys himself, the spendthrift is undone.
