Pain

Pain (?), n. [OE. peine, F. peine, fr. L. poena, penalty, punishment, torment, pain; akin to Gr. ? penalty. Cf. Penal, Pine to languish, Punish.] 1. Punishment suffered or denounced; suffering or evil inflicted as a punishment for crime, or connected with the commission of a crime; penalty. Chaucer.

We will, by way of mulct or pain, lay it upon him.

Interpose, on pain of my displeasure.

None shall presume to fly, under pain of death.

2. Any uneasy sensation in animal bodies, from slight uneasiness to extreme distress or torture, proceeding from a derangement of functions, disease, or injury by violence; bodily distress; bodily suffering; an ache; a smart. "The pain of Jesus Christ." Chaucer.

☞ Pain may occur in any part of the body where sensory nerves are distributed, and it is always due to some kind of stimulation of them. The sensation is generally referred to the peripheral end of the nerve.

3. pl. Specifically, the throes or travail of childbirth.

She bowed herself and travailed, for her pains came upon her.

4. Uneasiness of mind; mental distress; disquietude; anxiety; grief; solicitude; anguish. Chaucer.

In rapture as in pain.

5. See Pains, labor, effort.

Bill of pains and penalties. See under Bill. -- To die in the pain, to be tortured to death. [Obs.] Chaucer.

Pain, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Pained (?); p. pr. & vb. n. Paining.] [OE. peinen, OF. pener, F. peiner to fatigue. See Pain, n.] 1. To inflict suffering upon as a penalty; to punish. [Obs.] Wyclif (Acts xxii. 5).

2. To put to bodily uneasiness or anguish; to afflict with uneasy sensations of any degree of intensity; to torment; to torture; as, his dinner or his wound pained him; his stomach pained him.

Excess of cold, as well as heat, pains us.

3. To render uneasy in mind; to disquiet; to distress; to grieve; as a child's faults pain his parents.

I am pained at my very heart.

To pain one's self, to exert or trouble one's self; to take pains; to be solicitous. [Obs.] "She pained her to do all that she might." Chaucer.

Syn. -- To disquiet; trouble; afflict; grieve; aggrieve; distress; agonize; torment; torture.