Carries an exposition and defence of Locke's view that no individual has, per se, any essential qualities. His views about the essences of kinds—nominal and real—is given. He connected nominal essences with meanings, but Leibniz and Kripke showed that meanings involve real essences as well. Locke's unstable view about how essences relate to universals is also dealt with.
Keywords: essence, Kripke, Leibniz, Locke, meaning, universals