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A mental disorder in which melancholy and gloomy views torment the affected person, particularly concerning his own health.

patience he inly swelt More for great sorrow that he could not pass, Than for the burning torment which he felt. Spenser.

To compose; to write, as a poem. Wounded I sing, tormented I indite. Herbert.

The act of inflicting or imposing; as, the infliction of torment, or of punishment.

or sorrow expressed in complaints or cries; lamentation; a wailing; a moaning; a weeping. Torment, and loud lament, and furious rage. Milton.

A female demon who torments people in sleep by crouching on their chests or stomachs, or by causing terrifying visions.

To persecute; to torment; to torture. Chaucer. The lovely Amoret, whose gentle heart Thou martyrest with sorrow and with smart. Spenser. Racked with sciatics, martyred with the stone. Pope.

Affliction; torment; torture. Chaucer.

y 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

To torture; to cause to have great pain or suffering; to torment. [R.] Shak.

Woe; torment; pain. [Obs.] "Pyne of hell." Chaucer.

That which smites, wounds, or troubles; a blow; a calamity; any afflictive evil or torment; a great trail or vexation. Shak. And men blasphemed God for the plague of hail. Wyclif. The different plague of each calamity. Shak.

Vexatious; troublesome; tormenting; as, a plaguy horse. [Colloq.] Also used adverbially; as, "He is so plaguy proud." Shak.

the best at another's expense. [Colloq.] -- To put to the rack, to subject to torture; to torment. A fit of the stone puts a kingto the rack, and makes him as miserable as it does the meanest subject. Sir W. Temple.

To scold or rail at; to rate; to tease; to torment; to banter. [Prov. Eng.] Pegge.

Especially, anger accompanied with raving; overmastering wrath; violent anger; fury. torment, and loud lament, and furious rage. Milton.

To rub with rosin, as musicians rub the bow of a violin. Or with the rosined bow torment the string. Gay.

A European herb, the tormentil. See Tormentil.

A punishment like that of Tantalus; a teasing or tormenting by the hope or near approach of good which is not attainable; tantalization. Addison. Is not such a provision like tantalism to this people Josiah Quincy.

To tease or torment by presenting some good to the view and exciting desire, but continually frustrating the expectations by keeping that good out of reach; to tease; to torment. Thy vain desires, at strife Within themselves, have tantalized thy life. Dryden.