Hastings [q. v.], he did much to increase the efficiency of the grammar schools and parish schools in the island. He was created D.D. at Oxford on 3 April 1707, and incorporated at Cambridge on 11 June. In 1724 he founded, and in 1732 endowed, a school at Burton, his birthplace.
The restoration of ecclesiastical discipline was, from the first, an object which Wilson had at heart. Scandalous cases, frequently involving the morals of the clergy, gave him much trouble. The ‘spiritual statutes’ of the island (valid, where not superseded by the Anglican canons of 1603) were of native growth, and often uncouth in their provisions. Without attempting to disturb these (with the single exception of abolishing commutation of penance by fine), Wilson drew up his famous ‘Ecclesiastical Constitutions,’ ten in number, which were subscribed by the clergy in a convocation at Bishop's Court on 3 Feb. 1704, ratified by the governor and council on 4 Feb., confirmed by James Stanley, tenth earl of Derby (d. 1736), and publicly proclaimed on the Tinwald Hill on 6 June. Of these constitutions it was said by Sir Peter King, first lord King [q. v.], that ‘if the ancient discipline of the church were lost, it might be found in all its purity in the Isle of Man.’
The discipline worked smoothly till 1713, ‘when it came into collision with the official class’ (Moore, p. 192), owing to an apprehended reduction of revenue through Wilson's practice of mitigating fines in the spiritual court. Robert Mawdesley (d. 1732), governor from 1703, had been in harmony with Wilson; his successor in 1713, Alexander Horne, became Wilson's determined opponent. The first direct conflict began in 1716. Mary Henricks, a married woman, was excommunicated (22 Oct.) for adultery, and condemned to penance and prison. She appealed (20 Dec.) to the lord of the isle, and Horne allowed the appeal; Wilson, rightly maintaining that there was no appeal except to the archbishop of York, did not appear at the hearing (23 Dec. 1717, in London), and was fined (19 Feb. 1719) in 10l.; the fine was remitted (20 Aug.). The episcopal registrar, John Woods of Kirk Malew, was twice imprisoned (1720 and 1721) for refusing to act without the bishop's direction. The governor's wife (Jane Horne) was ordered (19 Dec. 1721) to ask forgiveness (in mitigation of penance) for slanderous statements. For admitting her to communion and for false doctrine Archdeacon Robert Horrobin, the governor's chaplain, was suspended (17 May 1722). Refusing to recall the sentence, Wilson was fined (25 June) 50l., and his vicars-general 20l. apiece, and in default were imprisoned in Castle Rushen (29 June). Wilson appealed to the crown (19 July); they were released on 31 Aug., but the fines were paid through Thomas Corlett. The dampness of the prison had so affected Wilson's right hand that he was henceforth unable to move his fingers in writing. In 1724 the bishopric of Exeter was offered to Wilson as a means of reimbursement. On his declining, George I promised to meet his expenses from the privy purse, a pledge which the king's death left unfulfilled.
Part of Horrobin's false doctrine was his approval of a book which Wilson had censured. On 19 Jan. 1722 John Stevenson, a layman of Balladoole, forwarded to Wilson a copy of the ‘Independent Whig,’ 1721, 8vo [see Gordon, Thomas, (d. 1750), and Trenchard, John, (1662–1723)], which had been circulated in the island and sent to Stevenson by Richard Worthington for the public library. Wilson issued (27 Jan.) a pastoral letter to his clergy, bidding them excommunicate the ‘agents and abettors’ of ‘such-like blasphemous books.’ For suppressing the book Stevenson was imprisoned in Castle Rushen by Horne, who required Wilson to deliver up the volume as a condition of Stevenson's release. This he did (21 Feb.) under protest. When the book reached William Ross, the librarian, he said ‘he would as soon take poison as receive that book into the library upon any other terms or conditions than immediately to burn it.’ Horrobin, on the other hand, affirmed (December 1722) that the work ‘had rules and directions in it sufficient to bring us to heaven, if we could observe them’ (cf. Letter to the publisher, by W[alter] A[wbery], prefixed to Independent Whig, 5th edit. 1732).
Horne was superseded in 1723. Floyd, his successor, was generally unpopular. With the appointment of Thomas Horton in 1725, began a new conflict between civil and ecclesiastical authority. Lord Derby now claimed (5 Oct. 1725) that the act of Henry VIII, placing Man in the province of York, abrogated all insular laws in matters spiritual. The immediate result was that Horton refused to carry out a recent decision of the House of Keys, granting soldiers to execute orders of the ecclesiastical court. A revision of the ‘spiritual statutes’ was proposed by the House of Keys, with Wilson's concurrence. Horton took the step of suspending the whole code till ‘amended and revised.’ He further deprived the sumner-general and appointed another. Unavailing petitions for redress were sent to Lord Derby; the House of
