The Spectator, a daily publication founded by Joseph Addison and Richard Steele in England after they met at Charterhouse School, lasts from 1711 to 1712.

Each "paper", or "number", is approximately 2,twenty-five hundred words long, and the original run consists of five hundred and fifty-five numbers, beginning on March 1, 1711.

These are collected into seven volumes.

The paper is revived in 1714 without the involvement of Steele, appearing thrice weekly for six months, and these papers when collected form the eighth volume.

Eustace Budgell, a cousin of Addison's, also contributes to the publication.

The stated goal of The Spectator is "to enliven morality with wit, and to temper wit with morality...to bring philosophy out of the closets and libraries, schools and colleges, to dwell in clubs and assemblies, at tea-tables and coffeehouses" (No. 10).

It recommends that its readers "consider it part of the tea-equipage" (No. 10) and not leave the house without reading it in the morning.

One of its functions is to provide readers with educated, topical talking points, and advice in how to carry on conversations and social interactions in a polite manner.

In keeping with the values of Enlightenment philosophies of their time, the authors of The Spectator promote family, marriage, and courtesy.

Despite a modest daily circulation of approximately three thousand copies, The Spectator is widely read; Joseph Addison estimates that each number is read by sixty thousand Londoners, about a tenth of the capital's population at this time.

Contemporary historians and literary scholars, meanwhile, do not consider this to be an unreasonable claim; most readers are not themselves subscribers but patrons of one of the subscribing coffeehouses.

These readers come from many stations in society, but the paper caters principally to the interests of England's emerging middle class—merchants and traders large and small.