These instances are sufficient to shew unmistakably that one rite influenced the other. But the stage at which the similarity is so noticeable is a late stage in the history of both rites, and at an earlier date when both were more simple, much of the later parallelism is not to be found. In the process of the great liturgical developements of the middle ages there was naturally an assimilation in the case of the consecration of persons, and there seems to have been a good deal of experimenting in the case of the rite of the consecration of a king, many pontificals containing orders with various peculiarities, which certainly were never used. But on the other hand there is also to be noticed a careful differentiation between the two rites, and this especially in the Roman orders. The Roman rite was never elaborate and in process of time tended to a greater simplicity. Thus the investiture of a king with the Ring does not appear in it except for a very short time, and then from outside sources; in the same rite the unctions are only two in number, and there is a difference in the parts anointed in the case of a king, he being anointed only between the shoulders and on the wrist. If, as is most likely, kings in the West were anointed on the head, this differentiation between the anointing of a bishop and a king seems deliberate on the part of the Roman Church. Moreover, while it is true that in England and France chrism was used for the unction of a king as for a bishop, in the Roman rite chrism was never so used in the case of a king, but only the ‘oleum catechumenorum.’ Officially then the Church denied the name of Sacrament to the royal consecration, allowing it the rank of a Sacramental only. In practice the repetition of the rite which so often occurred, and in the case of the Roman Emperor was normally performed three times, proves sufficiently that it was not an ordination conferring character. Historically considered the rite proves itself to be in origin a special benediction elaborated and developed almost out of recognition as such. A careful examination of the construction of the rite shews that in it there are three well marked divisions. 1. The election of the king. 2. The oath taken by the king to rule in accordance with law and justice. 3. The benediction superadded to the covenant so made between king and people. Of the election the Recognition is the surviving trace. It may be noted that the idea of the election of the king is retained till quite late in the developement of the rite. Until the time of the fourth English recension, these words still appeared, _Quem in huius regni regem pariter eligimus_. In the fourth English recension _eligimus_ was changed to _consecramus_, but in the French rite this change was never made and the word _eligimus_ was used without alteration.