The Complete Aristotle (eng.)

from the disgrace itself and not from its consequences,
and we only care what opinion is held of us because of the people
who form that opinion, it follows that the people before whom we
feel shame are those whose opinion of us matters to us. Such
persons are: those who admire us, those whom we admire, those by
whom we wish to be admired, those with whom we are competing, and
those whose opinion of us we respect. We admire those, and wish
those to admire us, who possess any good thing that is highly
esteemed; or from whom we are very anxious to get something that
they are able to give us-as a lover feels. We compete with our
equals. We respect, as true, the views of sensible people, such as
our elders and those who have been well educated. And we feel more
shame about a thing if it is done openly, before all men’s eyes.
Hence the proverb, ‘shame dwells in the eyes’. For this reason we
feel most shame before those who will always be with us and those
who notice what we do, since in both cases eyes are upon us. We
also feel it before those not open to the same imputation as
ourselves: for it is plain that their opinions about it are the
opposite of ours. Also before those who are hard on any one whose
conduct they think wrong; for what a man does himself, he is said
not to resent when his neighbours do it: so that of course he does
resent their doing what he does not do himself. And before those
who are likely to tell everybody about you; not telling others is
as good as not be lieving you wrong. People are likely to tell
others about you if you have wronged them, since they are on the
look out to harm you; or if they speak evil of everybody, for those
who attack the innocent will be still more ready to attack the
guilty. And before those whose main occupation is with their
neighbours’ failings-people like satirists and writers of comedy;
these are really a kind of evil-speakers and tell-tales. And before
those who have never yet known us come to grief, since their
attitude to us has amounted to admiration so far: that is why we
feel ashamed to refuse those a favour who ask one for the first
time-we have not as yet lost credit with them. Such are those who
are just beginning to wish to be our friends; for they have seen
our best side only (hence the appropriateness of Euripides’ reply
to the Syracusans): and such also are those among our old
acquaintances who know nothing to our discredit. And we are ashamed
not merely of the actual shameful conduct mentioned, but also of
the evidences of it: not merely, for example, of actual sexual
intercourse, but also of its evidences; and not merely of
disgraceful acts but also of disgraceful talk. Similarly we feel
shame not merely in presence of the persons mentioned but also of
those who will tell them what we have done, such as their servants
or friends. And, generally, we feel no shame before those upon
whose opinions we quite look down as untrustworthy (no one feels
shame before small children or animals); nor are we ashamed of the
same things before intimates as before strangers, but before the
former of what seem genuine faults, before the latter of what seem
conventional ones.
    The conditions under which we shall feel shame are these: first,
having people related to us like those before whom, as has been
said, we feel shame. These are, as was stated, persons whom we
admire, or who admire us, or by whom we wish to be admired, or from
whom we desire some service that we shall not obtain if we forfeit
their good opinion. These persons may be actually looking on (as
Cydias represented them in his speech on land assignments in Samos,
when he told the Athenians to imagine the Greeks to be standing all
around them, actually seeing the way they voted and not merely
going to hear about it afterwards): or again they may be near at
hand, or may be likely to find out about what we do. This is why in
misfortune we do not wish to be seen by those who once wished
themselves like us; for such a feeling implies admiration. And men
feel shame when they have acts or exploits to their credit on which
they are bringing dishonour, whether these are their own, or those
of their ancestors, or those of other persons with whom they have
some close connexion. Generally, we feel shame before those for
whose own misconduct we should also feel it-those already
mentioned; those who take us as their models; those whose teachers
or advisers we have been; or other people, it may be,