abstention vs essay

abstention

noun
  • Non-participation in the political world; as a country avoiding international affairs. 

  • The act of declining to vote on a particular issue. 

  • The act of abstaining or refraining (from). 

essay

noun
  • A written composition of moderate length, exploring a particular issue or subject. 

  • A proposed design for a postage stamp or a banknote. 

verb
  • To move forth, as into battle. 

How often have the words abstention and essay occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )