by no means

From by + no + means (“condition or instrument to achieve a result”).^[1]

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /baɪ nəʊ ˈmiːnz/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /baɪ noʊ ˈminz/

• Audio (General American):

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• Audio (General Australian):

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• Rhymes: -iːnz

by no means

1. (idiomatic) Certainly not; definitely not; not at all.

   Synonyms: (archaic) by no manner of means, by no stretch, by no stretch of the imagination, in no way, never ever, never in a million years, not a chance, (archaic) not by any manner of means, not by any means, not by a long way, not in a million years, not in the least, on no account, under no circumstances

   Antonyms: by all means, by any means

   By no means am I suggesting that euthanasia should be outlawed, but rather that we should look at its inherent risks.

   Is that all you’ve got to say? ―By no means. Let me explain further.

   • 1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Gardens”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC, page 278:

     For the Maine Garden, I doe not Deny, but there ſhould be ſome Faire Alleys, ranged on both Sides, vvith Fruit Trees; And ſome Pretty Tufts of Fruit Trees, And Arbours vvith Seats, ſet in ſome Decent Order; but theſe to be, by no Meanes, ſet too thicke; […]

   • 1711 May 9 (Gregorian calendar), [Richard Steele], “SATURDAY, April 28, 1711”, in The Spectator, number 51; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume I, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, page 325:

     I was last night at the Funeral, where a confident lover in the play, speaking of his mistress, cries out—"Oh that Harriot! to fold these arms about the waist of that beauteous, struggling, and at last yielding fair!" Such an image as this ought by no means to be presented to a chaste and regular audience.

     Steele was quoting from a criticism of one of his own plays, The Funeral (written 1701).

   • 1782, [Frances Burney], “A Wrangling”, in Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress. […], volume V, London: […] T[homas] Payne and Son […], and T[homas] Cadell […], →OCLC, book IX, page 52:

     Cecilia, thanking him for the offer, ſaid ſhe meant novv to make her acknovvledgments for all the trouble he had already taken, but by no means purpoſed to give him any more.

   • 1879, Matthew Arnold, “A French Critic on Goethe”, in Mixed Essays, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […], →OCLC, page 311:

     It is by no means as the greatest of poets that Goethe deserves the pride and praise of his German countrymen. It is as the clearest, the largest, the most helpful thinker of modern times.

   • 1886, Gustave Flaubert, chapter IX, in Eleanor Marx-Aveling, transl., Madame Bovary: Provincial Manners […], London: Vizetelly & Co., […], →OCLC, part I, page 72:

     [S]he was by no means tender-hearted or easily accessible to the feelings of others, like most country-bred people, who always retain in their souls something of the horny hardness of the paternal hands.

   • 1891, Algernon Charles Swinburne, “Social Verse”, in Studies in Prose and Poetry, London: Chatto & Windus, […], →OCLC, page 105:

     The compilers of the volume may very naturally have been tempted to strain a point so as to admit some specimen from the hand of the most potent if by no means the most perfect of English poetesses [Elizabeth Barrett Browning]: but in that case they would have done much better, in my humble opinion, to select the beautiful and simple memorial stanzas, […]

   • 1915, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, chapter LXXIII, in Of Human Bondage, New York, N.Y.: George H[enry] Doran Company, →OCLC, page 376:

     He wrote to her the next day, sent her a five-pound note, and at the end of his letter said that if she were very nice and cared to see him for the week-end he would be glad to run down; but she was by no means to alter any plans she had made.

   • 1952 February, H[enry] C[yril] Casserley, “Permanent Wayfarings”, in The Railway Magazine, London: Tothill Press, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 78:

     Every photographer of experience has his own theories and methods of working, but for the last 14 years I have used a Leica exclusively, and have found it best adapted to the somewhat exacting demands of railway photography, which is by no means an easy branch of the art.

   • 2021 July 28, Christian Wolmar, “Forgotten by the Railways, but Ripe for the Exploring”, in Rail, number 936, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire: Bauer Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 35:

     Well, during our short staycation at Humberston Fitties, just south of Cleethorpes, we cycled through the very unspoilt Lincolnshire Wolds, which are by no means flat and boring as conventional wisdom about the county suggests.