He was the eldest child of Edward Hawkins, successively vicar of Bisley in Gloucestershire and rector of Kelston in Somerset.
There he introduced the Sunday parochial afternoon sermon, made famous under his successor, John Henry Newman.
On 2 February 1828 Hawkins was elected by the fellows provost of Oriel, in succession to Copleston who had been appointed bishop of Llandaff.
When, in February 1841, the heads of houses proposed a sentence of condemnation on the Tract 90, to become notorious, Hawkins was commissioned to draw up the document; and for several years his life was embittered by the struggle with the tractarians.
He died, after a few days' illness, on 18 November 1882, within three months of completing his ninety-fourth year, and was buried in the cathedral cemetery at Rochester.
The substance of the sermon was published in 1819, and was reprinted by the Christian Knowledge Society in 1889, with the title, A Dissertation upon the Use and Importance of Unauthoritative Tradition.
John Henry Newman, who as an undergraduate heard it preached, mentioned it in his Apologia Pro Vita Sua: It made a most serious impression upon me.
that the sacred text was never intended to teach doctrine, but only to prove it; and that if we would learn doctrine we must have recourse to the formularies of the church; for instance, to the Catechism and to the Creeds.Hawkins afterwards treated the same subject more fully in his Bampton lectures (1840) under the title, An Inquiry into the connected Uses of the principal means of attaining Christian Truth; these being the scriptures and the church, human reason and illuminating grace.
Hawkins edited John Milton's poetical works, with notes, and Newton's life of the poet, 4 vols.
He also published numerous sermons, including Other works are: He married on 28 December 1828 Mary Ann Buckle (died 14 January 1892) who with a son and daughter survived him.