David Hume_x0019_ s An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding was a simplification of an earlier effort Hume was disappointed with the reception of the Treatise of Human Nature He felt that if x001C fell dead-born from the press x001D as he put it and so tried again to disseminate his ideas to the public by writing a shorter and more polemical work. The Enquiry dispensed with much of the material from the Treatise in favor of clarifying and emphasizing its most important aspects.