Wilson was a major figure in the development and reform of Victorian public schools and promoted the teaching of science, which had until then been neglected. He was maths and science master at
Rugby School from 1859 to 1879 and headmaster of
Clifton College from 1879 to 1890. He made astronomical observations (particularly of
double stars) at Temple Observatory at Rugby with his former student
George Mitchell Seabroke. Temple Observatory was named after
Frederick Temple, headmaster of Rugby School, who later became
Bishop of Exeter and
Archbishop of Canterbury. Wilson was encouraged by Temple to write the textbook
Elementary Geometry, which was published in 1868. Until that time,
Euclid's Elements had remained the standard textbook used in British schools. With
Joseph Gledhill and
Edward Crossley, Wilson co-wrote
Handbook of Double Stars in 1879, which became a standard reference work in astronomy. His astronomical observations seem to have come to an end after he left Rugby and went to Clifton. While at Clifton, he successfully pushed for the creation of St Agnes Park in
Bristol, as part of a plan to improve the lives of the urban poor. In April 1890, he addressed girls at
St Leonards School, stressing the connection of religion with their possible role as university students and
social workers whilst assisting women such as
Octavia Hill to alleviate the plight of the "labouring masses, and in particular the (poor) women and girls of England". After his teaching career, he became Vicar of
Rochdale,
Archdeacon of Manchester from 1890 to 1905, a canon of
Worcester Cathedral from 1905 to 1926 and vice-dean of the cathedral. He was
Hulsean lecturer at Cambridge in 1898;
Lady Margaret Preacher at Cambridge in 1900; and Lecturer in Pastoral Theology at Cambridge in 1902. He wholeheartedly accepted the
theory of evolution and its implications for the literal interpretation of the Bible. He gave two lectures in 1892 in which he accepted Darwinism and argued that it was compatible with a higher view of Christianity; the lectures were published by the
Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge, which had a few years earlier strongly opposed Darwinian ideas. In 1921, he served for one year as president of The
Mathematical Association of the UK. In 1925 he wrote an essay entitled "The Religious Effect of the Idea of Evolution". He wrote a number of books, including
Life after Death "with replies by Sir
Arthur Conan Doyle" in 1920. In addition to spiritual works, he co-wrote an astronomy book on double stars (mentioned above) and mathematical books on
geometry and
conic sections. He contributed the article "On two fragments of geometrical treatises found in Worcester Cathedral" to the
Mathematical Gazette (March 1911, p. 19). ==Family==