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The expression Christmas spirit designates a mood or attitude appropriate to the Christmas season, especially one involving feelings of goodwill, benevolence and a willingness to enjoy oneself.

These are, in chronological order, the earliest occurrences of the expression Christmas spirit that I have found:

1-: From a letter to the Editor, by ‘Old Social’, published in The Derby Mercury (Derby, Derbyshire, England) of Wednesday 26^th December 1827 [page 4, column 1]:

Sir,
I am an old man, but thank God with all my feelings and faculties entire and alive about me, and this season of the year with its many delightful associations seems to give me back my youth. But it is with deep regret that I perceive the young people of this generation, almost strangers to that tide of benevolent heart-burstings which characterized my younger days […].
I wish, Sir, I could persuade the young people of these times, that they would be both happier and better for spending Christmas in the true spirit, which is to be merry themselves, and to make others happy. […]
This Christmas spirit should methinks be more particularly kept up in the country, because those who dwell in retirement are in danger of living too much for themselves, and of becoming selfish and individualized.

2[?]-: From The Age (London, England) of Sunday 22^nd December 1833 [page 405, column 3]—however, here, the expression is “our Christmas spirits” and refers to the opposite of what Christmas spirit designates:

THE CHEERLESS CHRISTMAS, 1833.

We shall have celebrated (?) ere our next number will be given to the inspection and perusal of our legion of readers, the festival of Christmas. It may be naturally expected from those that know us of old, that we should have our preliminary budget of fun now to bring forward at this “season of the year;” and that by anticipation we should be filled with all those congratulations—“happy return,” &c. usual upon this anniversary. That we do most cordially wish every prosperity to the numerous friends we have, and to those we intend to have, is “true—most true;” but we have our qualms touching the celebration of the coming festival; we are no hypocrites, and we honestly declare that our celebration will, if at all undertaken, be a melancholy one. Our Christmas spirits is not the spirit of gladness, when we see what is passing around us, alas! The thing is not in us. The Christmas-time that we see before us is in no wise like the Christmas-time that we were used to in days that are past.

3 & 4-: From The Book of Christmas (London: William Spooner, 1836), by the Scottish author Thomas Kibble Hervey (1799-1859):

3-: [First Part. The Christmas Season: page 114]:

By the year 1647, the puritans had so far prevailed, that, […] the observance of the festival itself, with that of other holidays, was formally abolished by the two branches of the legislature.
It was found impossible, however, by all these united means, to eradicate the Christmas spirit from the land; and many of its customs and festivities continued to be observed, not only in obscure places, but even in towns, in spite of prohibition, and in spite of the disarrangement of social ties.

4-: [Second Part. The Christmas Days. Christmas Eve. 24^th December: page 264]:

The customs peculiar to Christmas-eve are numerous,—and various in different parts of the British isles;—the peculiarities, in most cases, arising from local circumstances or traditions, and determining the particular forms of a celebration which is universal. To enter upon any thing like an enumeration of these, it would be necessary to allow ourselves another volume. We must, therefore, confine ourselves to the general observances by which the Christmas spirit works.

5-: From The Stranger’s Gift. A Christmas and New Year’s Present. Edited by Hermann Bokum (Boston (Massachusetts): Light and Horton, 1836) [Conclusion: page 101]—“his indulgence” and “him” refer to the reader:

I would not ask his indulgence on account of the imperfect form in which this little Gift is presented, without at the same time expressing the hope, that the Christmas spirit in which these pages have been written will dispose him to regard them with the eye of a friend rather than a critic.

6-: From the column Literature, published in The British Queen, and Statesman (London, England) of Saturday 7^th January 1843 [page 10, column 3]:

Fraser’s Magazine. London: Nickisson, Regent-street.
The current number of Fraser makes one think of May rather than January, and yet it has, together with matters of grave moment, several articles which are almost peculiar to the season, and which breathe a fireside and Christmas spirit in every line.