[3][4] With Henry Hoare of Staplehurst and others, he was a pupil in 1819 at Stanstead Park, near Racton in Sussex, of George Hodson, at that time chaplain to Lewis Way.

His friends included William Ewart Gladstone and Henry Edward Manning, and were nicknamed the "Bethel Union" for their religiosity.

[3] In 1830, Wilberforce was presented by Charles Sumner, Bishop of Winchester, to the rectory of St Mary's Church, Brighstone, in the Isle of Wight.

[9][10] In November 1839 he was installed archdeacon of Surrey, in August 1840 he was collated canon of Winchester, and in October he accepted the rectory of Alverstoke.

[9] In March 1845 Wilberforce accepted the position of Dean of Westminster and, in October the same year, was appointed as the Bishop of Oxford by Sir Robert Peel.

This gave small grants intended to act as a lever for more substantial funding from other sources, a successful fundraising approach.

In 1838 his divergence from the Tractarian writers became so evident that John Henry Newman declined further contributions from him to the British Critic.

[13] He signed the remonstrance of 13 bishops to Lord John Russell against the appointment of Hampden, accused of heretical views, to the bishopric of Hereford.

[3] In 1867 Wilberforce framed the first Report of the Ritualistic Commission, in which coercive measures against ritualism were undermined by the use of the word "restrain" instead of "abolish" or "prohibit."

He was strongly opposed to the disestablishment of the Irish Church, but when the constituencies decided for it, he advised that no opposition should be made to it by the House of Lords.

[14] In 1979, JR Lucas argued that "Wilberforce, contrary to the central tenet of the legend, did not prejudge the issue".

[15] Nonetheless, Wilberforce's speech is generally only remembered today for his inquiry as to whether it was through his grandmother or his grandfather that Huxley considered himself descended from a monkey.

[9] On the publication of John William Colenso's Commentary on the Romans in 1861, Wilberforce endeavoured to induce the author to hold a private conference with him; but after the publication of the first two parts of the Pentateuch Critically Examined he drew up the address of the bishops which called on Colenso to resign his bishopric.

[9] The publication of Universalis Ecclesiae, the papal bull in 1850 re-establishing a Roman Catholic hierarchy in England, brought the High Church party, of whom Wilberforce had become a prominent member, into temporary disrepute.

[9] "Soapy Sam" may have been a reference to Wilberforce's characteristic hand-washing gesture, captured in the Vanity Fair cartoon by "Ape" (illustration, right).

[9] He left a diary, and its content is considered influenced in parts by the editorial work he did on his father's papers, while also revealing of his own emotional life.

[19] The anonymous Britannica 1911 author wrote of it that His diary reveals a tender and devout private life which has been overlooked by those who have only considered the versatile facility and persuasive expediency that marked the successful public career of the bishop, and perhaps earned him the sobriquet of "Soapy Sam".

[3] Wilberforce appears, caricatured, in Anthony Trollope's novel The Warden (1855), where he is portrayed as the third child of the Archdeacon, Dr Grantly, who is named Samuel and nicknamed Soapy, and is engaging and ingratiating but not to be trusted.