The Monthly Magazine (1796–1843) of London began publication in February 1796. Richard Phillips was the publisher and a contributor on political issues. The editor for the first ten years was the literary jack-of-all-trades, Dr John Aikin. Other contributors included William Blake,Samuel Taylor Coleridge, George Dyer, Henry Neele and Charles Lamb. The magazine also published the earliest fiction of Charles Dickens, the first of what would become Sketches by Boz.
From 1839 the magazine was for two years edited by Francis Foster Barham and John Abraham Heraud. Its content in this period has been described as "popularizations of post-Kantian philosophy, esoteric mystical commentary, literary effusions, and idealistic calls for child-centered education and communitarian socialism."