wake sleeping dogs —(also: wake a sleeping dog ) create trouble interfering with a precarious situation which is quiet:
- Some say that it is too early to fix any rules, or that it is really dangerous to do so: it might wake sleeping dogs.
Cf.: let sleeping dogs lie—refrain from stirring up potential trouble:
- How many times had he told her it was over, that she needed to move on and let sleeping dogs lie?
wake snakes —(dated sl.) cause trouble or disturbance:
- But what about some phrases that we don’t hear very often anymore? I found some of these quite interesting. To wake snakes, meant to raise a ruckus.