Schopenhauer on Some Forms of Literature in 'The Art of Literature'

"Human life is short and fleeting, and man millions of individuals share in it, who are swallowed by that monster of oblivion which is waiting for them with ever-open jaws. It is thus a very thankworthy task to try to rescue something - the memory of interesting an important events, or the leading features and personages of some epoch - from the general shipwreck of the world. From another point of view we might look upon history as the sequel to zoology [...] the object of science is to recognize the many in the one, to perceive the rules in any given example, and to apply to the life of nations a knowledge of mankind; not to go on counting up facts ad infinitum."