Friedlander addresses the central tension of Benjamin’s Arcades Project: how can a vast collection of fragments produce historical unity without collapsing into a premature system? His answer turns on the dialectical image. Collection and archive preserve contingency, concreteness and resistance to abstraction, but their materials must still become intuitable as a historical configuration. Methodologically, Friedlander links Benjamin’s conception of truth to Goethean morphology, where the archetype is not a hidden essence but an intelligible form appearing through variations. The historical image thus emerges when dispersed materials enter a constellation capable of revealing an underlying relation. The wider bridge is to archival theory and visual epistemology. The essay clarifies that montage is not mere accumulation: selection and arrangement must intensify the visibility of history. Its contribution lies in defining unity as an achieved image rather than an imposed totality.