"We must confess that we are disposed to look upon this limit |two hundred years for the Brahmanas] as much too brief for the establishment of an elaborate ritual, for the appropriation of all the spiritual authority by the Brahmans, for the distinctions of races or the institutions of caste, and for the mysticism and speculation of the Aranyakas or Upanishads: a period of five centuries would not seem to be too protracted for such a complete remodelling of the primitive system and its wide dissemination through all those parts of India where the Brahmans have spread."