Excerpt from The English Essay and Essayist What is an essay? Perhaps the notions most widely pre valent with regard to this question are, first, that an essay is a composition comparatively short, and second, that it is something incomplete and unsystematic. The latter, clearly, was Johnson's conception, and he was not only a great lexico grapher, but himself a notable essayist. He defines an essay to Jae a loose sally of the mind, an irregular, indigested piece, not a regular and orderly performance. The Oxford English Dictionary combines the two conceptions. Its de finition runs thus A composition Of moderate length on any particular subject, or branch of a subject; originally imply ing want of finish, an irregular, indigested piece but now said of a composition more or less elaborate in style, though limited in range. Both definitions are somewhat vague, and Johnson's is essentially negative - a sure Sign of difficulty. But vague as they are, these definitions are too narrow and precise to embrace all essays so-called. If we con ceive the essay to be short and incomplete, on the other hand we certainly conceive the treatise to be lengthy and systematic. But while Hume writes A Treatise of Human Nature, Locke writes An Essay concerning Human Understanding; and the latter work attempts as seriously as the former to be systematic, while it is the longer of the two. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.