Pain, n.
Etymology: [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. Bacon. Interpose, on pain of my displeasure. Dryden. None shall presume to fly, under pain of death. Addison.
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.
Note: 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.
3 more senses
Specifically, the throes or travail of childbirth. She bowed herself and travailed, for her pains came upon her. 1 Sam. iv. 19.
4. Uneasiness of mind; mental distress; disquietude; anxiety; grief; solicitude; anguish. Chaucer. In rapture as in pain. Keble.
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.
1 other Webster entry under this spelling
Pain, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Pained; p. pr. & vb. n. Paining.]
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. Lock
3. To render uneasy in mind; to disquiet; to distress; to grieve; as a child's faults pain his parents. I am pained at mJer. iv. 19. 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.
Shades of meaning
Pain is the most general term of this group, including all the others; pain is a disturbing sensation from which nature revolts, resulting from some injurious external interference (as from a wound, a bruise, a harsh word, etc.), or from some lack of what one needs, craves, or cherishes (as, the pain of hunger or bereavement), or from some abnormal action of bodily or mental functions (as, the pains of disease, envy, or discontent). Suffering is one of the severer forms of pain. The prick of a needle causes pain, but we should scarcely speak of it as suffering. Distress is too strong a word for little hurts, too feeble for the intensest suffering, but commonly applied to some continuous or prolonged trouble or need; as, the distress of a shipwrecked crew, or of a destitute family. Ache is lingering pain, more or less severe; pang, a pain short, sharp, intense, and perhaps repeated. We speak of the pangs of hunger or of remorse. Throe is a violent and thrilling pain. Paroxysm applies to an alternately recurring and receding pain, which comes as it were in waves; the paroxysm is the rising of the wave. Torment and torture are intense and terrible sufferings. Agony and anguish express the utmost pain or suffering of body or mind. Agony of body is that with which the system struggles; anguish that by which it is crushed.