Dio Chrysostom, On Kingship 2.2

Then Philip admired his son greatly for his noble spirit, since it was plain that he harbored no unworthy or ignoble ideas but made the heroes and demigods his examples. Nevertheless, in his desire to arouse him, he said, "But take Hesiod, Alexander; do you judge him of little account as a poet?" 

"Nay, not I," he replied, "but of every account, though not for kings and generals, I suppose."

"Well, then, for whom?" 

And Alexander answered with a smile: "For shepherds, carpenters,​ and farmers; since he says that shepherds are beloved by the Muses, and to carpenters he gives very shrewd advice as to how large they should cut an axle, and to farmers, when to broach a cask."​ 

"Well," said Philip, "and is not such advice useful to men?" 

"Not to you and me, father," he replied, "nor to the Macedonians of the present day, though to those of former times it was useful, when they lived a slave's life, herding and farming for Illyrians and Triballians."​ 

"But do you not like these magnificent lines of Hesiod about seed-time and harvest?" said Philip:

Mark well the time when the Pleiads, daughters of Atlas, are rising;

Then begin with the harvest, but do not plough till their setting. 

"I much prefer what Homer says on farm-life," said Alexander. 

"And where," Philip asked, "has Homer anything to say about farming? Or do you refer to the representations on the shield of men ploughing and gathering the grain and the grapes?" 

"Not at all," said Alexander, "but rather to these well-known lines:

As when two lines of reapers, face to face,

In some rich landlord's field of barley or wheat

Move on, and fast the severed handfuls fall,

So, springing on each other, they of Troy

And they of Argos smote each other down,

And neither thought of ignominious flight. 

"And yet, in spite of such lines as these," said Philip, "Homer was defeated by Hesiod in the contest.​ Or have you not heard of the inscription which is inscribed upon the tripod that stands on Mount Helicon?"

Hesiod offered this gift to the Muses on Helicon's mountain

When at Chalcis in song he had vanquished Homer, the godlike. 

"And he richly deserved to be defeated," rejoined Alexander, "for he was not exhibiting his skill before kings, but before farmers and plain folk, or, rather, before men who were lovers of pleasure and effeminate. And that is why Homer used his poetry to avenge himself upon the Euboeans." 

"How so?" asked Philip in wonder. 

"He singled them out among all the Greeks for a most unseemly haircut, for he makes them wear their hair in long locks flowing down their backs,​as the poets of to‑day do in describing effeminate boys."

Philip laughed and said, "You observe, Alexander, that one must not offend good poets or clever writers, since they have the power to say anything they wish about us." 

"Not absolute power," said he; "it was a sorry day for Stesichorus, at any rate, when he told the lies about Helen.​ As for Hesiod, it seems to me that he himself, father, was not unaware of how much inferior his powers were to Homer's." 

"How is that?" 

"Because, while Homer wrote of heroes, he composed a Catalogue of Fair Women,​ and in reality made the women's quarters​ the subject of his song, yielding to Homer the eulogy of men."