William John Conybeare (1 August 1815 - 23 July 1857) was an English vicar, essayist and novelist.[1] Who was the first Principal of Liverpool College.
William John Conybeare was the son of Dean William Daniel Conybeare.[1] He attended Westminster School, where he formed a life-long friendship with George Cotton, later Bishop of Calcutta.[2] He matriculated at Trinity College, Cambridge in 1833, where he was elected fellow in 1837.[2]
From 1842 to 1848 Conybeare was principal of the Liverpool Collegiate Institution (later Liverpool College).[1] There, he worked with John Saul Howson, with whom he would later publish Perversion: or, the Causes and Consequences of Infidelity. Whilst in Liverpool, he campaigned for the improvement of middle-class education in the city.[2]
With his health deteriorating, Conybeare resigned his position at Liverpool in 1848 and moved to Axminster, Devon, to become vicar.[1] [2] He served there until 1854, when he moved to Weybridge, Surrey, where his brother-in-law, Edward Rose, was the parish priest. He died of tuberculosis in Weybridge in 1857, and is buried in Brompton Cemetery, London.[2] [3] He was survived by his wife, Eliza Rose (1820-1903), and his son, John William Edward Conybeare.[2]
Conybeare published Essays, Ecclesiastical and Social (1855), and a novel, Perversion: or, the Causes and Consequences of Infidelity (1856), but is best known as the joint author (along with John Saul Howson) of The Life and Epistles of St Paul [1] (1852, 2nd ed. 1856).[4]
He published Church Parties, a 30,000 word essay on the different styles of churchmanship found within the Anglican Church, in 1855.[2] [5]