 As a result of the focus on journals, the term also acquired a meaning synonymous with "article", although the content may not the strict definition.On the other hand, Locke's "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding" is not an essay at all, or cluster of essays, in the technical sense, but still it refers to the experimental and tentative nature of the inquiry which the philosopher was undertaking.In the 18th and 19th centuries, Edmund Burke and Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote essays for the general public.