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Anodyne vs Panacea - What's the difference?

anodyne | panacea |

As nouns the difference between anodyne and panacea

is that anodyne is any medicine or other agent that relieves pain while panacea is a remedy believed to cure all disease and prolong life that was originally sought by alchemists; a cure-all.

As an adjective anodyne

is capable of soothing or eliminating pain.

As a proper noun Panacea is

the goddess/personification of healing, remedies, cures and panaceas (medicines, salves, ointments and other curatives). She is a daughter of Asclepius and Epione.

anodyne

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Capable]] of [[soothe, soothing or eliminating pain.
  • * 1847 , Littell's Living Age , number 161, 12 June 1847, in Volume 13, page 483:
    • Many a time has the vapor of ether been inhaled for the relief of oppressed lungs; many a time has the sought relief been thus obtained; and just so many times has the discovery of the wonderful anodyne properties of this gas, as affecting all bodily suffering, been brushed past and overlooked.
  • * 1910 , Edward L. Keyes, Diseases of the Genito-Urinary Organs , page 211:
    • The citrate is the most efficient as an alkali, but irritates some stomachs, the liquor the most anodyne , the acetate the most diuretic.
  • (figuratively) Soothing or relaxing.
    • Classical music is rather anodyne .
  • Noncontentious, blandly agreeable, unlikely to cause offence or debate; bland, inoffensive.
  • * 2003 , The Guardian , 20 May 2003:
    • It all became so routine, so anodyne , so dull.
  • * 2010 , "Rattled", The Economist , 9 Dec 2010:
    • States typically like to stick to anodyne messages, like saving wildflowers or animals. But every so often a controversy crops up.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (pharmacology) Any medicine or other agent that relieves pain.
  • (figuratively) A source of relaxation or comfort.
  • *1890 , (Oscar Wilde), The Picture of Dorian Gray , ch. VII:
  • *:The air was heavy with the perfume of the flowers, and their beauty seemed to bring him an anodyne for his pain.
  • *1929 , (Virginia Woolf), A Room of One's Own , page 79:
    • So, with a sigh, because novels so often provide an anodyne and not an antidote, glide one into torpid slumbers instead of rousing one with a burning brand.

    Derived terms

    * anodynia * anodynous

    References

    * *

    Anagrams

    *

    panacea

    English

    Noun

  • A remedy believed to cure all disease and prolong life that was originally sought by alchemists; a cure-all.
  • Something that will solve all problems.
    • A monorail will be a panacea for our traffic woes.
  • (obsolete) A particular plant believed to provide a cure-all.
  • * 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , III.v:
    • There, whether it diuine Tobacco'' were, / Or ''Panachæa'' , or ''Polygony , / She found, and brought it to her patient deare [...].

    Synonyms

    * (remedy to cure all disease) catholicon, cure-all * (plant) allheal, woundwort

    See also

    * nostrum English words prefixed with pan- ----