AKCHYLIDES, nephew and pupil of the great Simonides, flourished about
460 B.C. He followed his uncle to the Court of Hiero at Syracuse, and
enjoyed the patronage of that despot. After Hiero's death he returned to
his home in Keos; but finding himself discontented with the mode of life
pursued in a free Greek community, for which his experiences at Hiero's
Court may well have disqualified him, he retired to Peloponnesus, where
he died. His works comprise specimens of almost every kind of lyric
composition, as practised by the Greeks of his time. Horace is said to
have imitated him in his _Prophecy of Nereus_, c. I. xv. (Pauly, as
above). So far as we can judge from what remains of his works, he was
distinguished rather by elegance than by force. A considerable fragment
on the Blessings of Peace has been translated by Mr. J. A. Symonds in
his work on the Greek poets. He is made the subject of a very bitter
allusion by Pindar (Ol. ii. s. fin. c. Schol.) We may suppose that the
stern and lofty spirit of Pindar had little sympathy with the "tearful"
(Catullus, xxxviii.) strains of Simonides or his imitators.

CAECILIUS, a native of Kale Akte in Sicily, and hence known as Caecilius
Kalaktinus, lived in Rome at the time of Augustus. He is mentioned with
distinction as a learned Greek rhetorician and grammarian, and was the
author of numerous works, frequently referred to by Plutarch and other
later writers. He may be regarded as one of the most distinguished Greek
rhetoricians of his time. His works, all of which have perished,
comprised, among many others, commentaries on Antipho and Lysias;
several treatises on Demosthenes, among which is a dissertation on the
genuine and spurious speeches, and another comparing that orator with
Cicero; "On the Distinction between Athenian and Asiatic Eloquence"; and
the work on the Sublime, referred to by Longinus (Pauly). The criticism
of Longinus on the above work may be thus summed up: Caecilius is
censured (1) as failing to rise to the dignity of his subject; (2) as
missing the cardinal points; and (3) as failing in practical utility. He
wastes his energy in tedious attempts to define the Sublime, but does
not tell us how it is to be attained (I. i.) He is further blamed for
omitting to deal with the Pathetic (VIII. i. _sqq._) He allows only two
metaphors to be employed together in the same passage (XXXII. ii.) He
extols Lysias as a far greater writer than Plato (_ib._ viii.), and is a
b