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Alexander Shields (c. 1660-1700)

Database

Alexander Shields (c. 1660-1700)

James Dodson

Biographical Sketch

Alexander Shields (c. 1660–1700) was born at Haughhead in the parish of Earlston, Berwickshire, the son of James Shields. He entered Edinburgh University at an early age and graduated M.A. in 1675. Averse to prelacy, he left his divinity studies under Lawrence Charteris and migrated to Holland, studying theology at Utrecht from 1680. After a period in London, where he is said to have acted as amanuensis to Dr. John Owen, he was licensed as a preacher by Scottish Presbyterians, declining the oath of allegiance as a Covenanter. His zealous opposition to the oath brought him under suspicion, and in January 1685 he was apprehended at a conventicle in Embroiderers’ Hall, Cheapside. Remitted to Scotland, he was examined by the privy council and the lords justices, and under threat of torture signed a renunciation of engagements declaring war against the king—a compliance he soon bitterly regretted. He was confined to the Bass Rock, from which he escaped in women’s clothes at the end of 1686.

Making his way at once to James Renwick, Shields publicly confessed his sin of owning the authority of James VII and became one of the most ardent champions of the Cameronian cause. His Hind Let Loose (1687), written during a trip to Holland to see it through the press, provided a vigorous historical and constitutional vindication of the Covenanters’ position, defending the right of armed resistance to tyranny and arguing that the monarch is a “public servant” accountable to the people. After Renwick’s execution in February 1688, Shields continued the policy of field meetings and approved the Cameronian insurrection later that year. In March 1689, with Thomas Lining and William Boyd, he took part in a solemn renewal of the covenants at Borland Hill, Lesmahagow. The following year, the three men submitted to the General Assembly and were received into fellowship, Shields having given satisfaction for his former compliance.

Shields was appointed chaplain to the Cameronian regiment in February 1691 and was called to the second charge at St. Andrews in 1696, being admitted in September 1697. In July 1699, the commission of the General Assembly authorized him to accompany the second Darien expedition as minister to the colonists. He sailed in the Rising Sun and reached Darien late in November, but the quarrels and disorders of the settlement disheartened him. After making several hazardous expeditions inland, he crossed to Jamaica with Francis Borland, only to be seized with malignant fever. He died on 14 June 1700 at Port Royal, Jamaica, in the house of Isabel Murray, aged about forty.


WORKS:

Database
A Sermon in the Canongate Meeting House , Feb. 10, 1691
A Sermon in the Canongate Meeting House , Feb. 10, 1691

1702-Alexander Shields.-This 1691 sermon, on 2 Samuel 15:26—preached as Shields’ farewell before departing for Flanders—explores the spiritual crisis of feeling abandoned by God, using David’s flight from Absalom to distinguish between God’s unchangeable love of benevolence and the sensible manifestations of His delight, which may be withdrawn due to sin or sovereignty. While believers cannot submit to being objects of God’s hatred, Shields argues they must submit to the loss of particular blessings, callings, or comforts, acknowledging God’s justice and their own unworthiness. The work remains profoundly relevant today for its nuanced treatment of spiritual desertion and the “dark night of the soul,” offering a framework for enduring the loss of religious privilege or felt presence without abandoning faith. Furthermore, its piercing critique of a lukewarm, compromised church—more aligned with “malignants” than with holiness—resonates sharply in an era of cultural Christianity and institutional decline, challenging modern believers to examine whether indifference and worldly alliance have forfeited God’s active delight. Ultimately, the sermon calls for a radical, resigned submission to God’s sovereign will, even when it means accepting that He may employ other instruments to accomplish His purposes.

A Short Memorial of the Sufferings and Grievances Past and Present of the Presbyterians in Scotland:
A Short Memorial of the Sufferings and Grievances Past and Present of the Presbyterians in Scotland:

1690-Alexander Shields.-This Short Memorial remains invaluable today as both a primary source of unflinching documentary evidence and a sustained legal argument against arbitrary power. Its meticulous catalog of thirty-three grievances—naming specific perpetrators, victims, fines, and extrajudicial killings—provides an irreplaceable record of the systematic dismantling of legal and ecclesiastical protections between 1660 and 1690, preserving details that official records often suppressed or sanitized. Beyond its historical testimony, the work's enduring significance lies in its constitutional reasoning: Shields demonstrates that the Cameronians' resistance was grounded not in sectarian anarchy but in the existing laws of Scotland, the conditions of the Coronation Oath, and the binding obligations of the National and Solemn League Covenants—arguing that allegiance is conditional upon the magistrate's fidelity to these fundamental compacts. Crucially, by extending his indictment into the “present grievances” under William, Shields exposes the Revolution’s incomplete settlement and establishes the continuity of protest that would shape the Reformed Presbyterian tradition, making this document essential for understanding how a principled minority could maintain that they were the true defenders of the national church and covenant, not schismatics from it.

A Hind let loose; or An Historical Representation of the Testimonies of the Church of Scotland,
A Hind let loose; or An Historical Representation of the Testimonies of the Church of Scotland,

1687-Alexander Shields.-A thorough survey of the history of the Scottish church which contains many hints on church communion together with several chapters devoted to Covenanter controversies.

An Informatory Vindication
An Informatory Vindication

1687-James Renwick and Alexander Shields.-This is an extensive apologetic for the course of act taken by the United Societies during the latter end of the Killing Times. It explains their beliefs and their actions in the face of the prevailing currents of apostasy and the vicious persecution that ensued on the covenant keepers.