Laudator Temporis Acti

Homer, Odyssey 8.214-229 (tr. Richmond Lattimore):

I am not bad in any of the contests where men strive.
I know well how to handle the polished bow, and would be        215
first to strike my man with an arrow aimed at a company
of hostile men, even though many companions were standing
close beside me, and all shooting with bows at the enemies.
There was Philoktetes alone who surpassed me in archery
when we Achaians shot with bows in the Trojan country.        220
But I will say that I stand far out ahead of all others
such as are living mortals now and feed on the earth. Only
I will not set myself against men of the generations
before, not with Herakles nor Eurytos of Oichalia,
who set themselves against the immortals with the bow, and therefore        225
great Eurytos died suddenly nor came to an old age
in his own mansions, since Apollo in anger against him
killed him, because he had challenged Apollo in archery. I can
throw with the spear as far as another casts with an arrow.

πάντα γὰρ οὐ κακός εἰμι, μετ᾽ ἀνδράσιν ὅσσοι ἄεθλοι·
εὖ μὲν τόξον οἶδα ἐύξοον ἀμφαφάασθαι·        215
πρῶτός κ᾽ ἄνδρα βάλοιμι ὀιστεύσας ἐν ὁμίλῳ
ἀνδρῶν δυσμενέων, εἰ καὶ μάλα πολλοὶ ἑταῖροι
ἄγχι παρασταῖεν καὶ τοξαζοίατο φωτῶν.
οἶος δή με Φιλοκτήτης ἀπεκαίνυτο τόξῳ
δήμῳ ἔνι Τρώων, ὅτε τοξαζοίμεθ᾽ Ἀχαιοί.        220
τῶν δ᾽ ἄλλων ἐμέ φημι πολὺ προφερέστερον εἶναι,
ὅσσοι νῦν βροτοί εἰσιν ἐπὶ χθονὶ σῖτον ἔδοντες.
ἀνδράσι δὲ προτέροισιν ἐριζέμεν οὐκ ἐθελήσω,
οὔθ᾽ Ἡρακλῆι οὔτ᾽ Εὐρύτῳ Οιχαλιῆι,
οἵ ῥα καὶ ἀθανάτοισιν ἐρίζεσκον περὶ τόξων.        225
τῷ ῥα καὶ αἶψ᾽ ἔθανεν μέγας Εὔρυτος, οὐδ᾽ ἐπὶ γῆρας
ἵκετ᾽ ἐνὶ μεγάροισι: χολωσάμενος γὰρ Ἀπόλλων
ἔκτανεν, οὕνεκά μιν προκαλίζετο τοξάζεσθαι.
δουρὶ δ᾽ ἀκοντίζω ὅσον οὐκ ἄλλος τις ὀιστῷ.

A.F. Garvie, ed., Homer, Odyssey, Books VI-VIII (1994; rpt. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), p. 282:

Odysseus claims to be outstanding as an archer. Despite 216-20, nowhere in Il. does Odysseus fight with the bow (at 10.260 he borrows, but does not use, that of Meriones), and he takes no part in the archery contest in the Funeral Games. Indeed few characters in the Il. use that weapon, which was evidently despised by the true hero; cf. Il. 11.385-90, and see Lorimer 289-301, Stanford, Ulysses theme 16, 71, Bond on Eur. HF 161. We need not conclude that the present passage presupposes a different, and perhaps earlier, tradition from that which underlies the Il. (Page 157-8, Hölscher, Epos 67-72), though, for all we know, Odysseus may have appeared as an archer in other versions of the story; cf. 9.156, 10.262. For Woodhouse 157, 184-5 Odysseus as an archer is a figure of folk-tale, as opposed to the Odysseus of saga. But with the climax of the poem already in mind H. may have attributed to him here a skill that is quite untraditional, at least in the context of Troy.