Fired by her success, another Milesian girl, named Aspasia, established herself at Athens. She set up a house of prostitution, and peopled it with the most lovely girls of the Ionic cities. But wherein she differed from her rivals and predecessors was the prominence she gave to intellect in her establishment. She lectured publicly, among her girls and their visitors, on rhetoric and philosophy, and with such marked ability that she counted among her patrons and lovers the first men of Greece, including Socrates, Alcibiades, and Pericles. The last divorced his wife in order to marry her, and was accused of allowing her to govern Athens, then at the height of its power and prosperity. She is said to have incited the war against Samos; and the principal cause of that against Megara was believed to have been the rape, by citizens of Megara, of two of Aspasia's girls. What a wonderful light these facts throw on Greek society! Enraged beyond control at her success, the virtuous women of Athens rose against her. She was publicly insulted at the theatre; was attacked in the street; and, as a last resort, was accused of impiety before the Areopagus. Pericles, then in the decline of his power, and unable to save his friends Phidias and Anaxagoras, appeared as her advocate. But on such an occasion his eloquence failed him. He could only seize his beloved wife in his arms, press her to his breast, and burst into tears in presence of the court. The appeal succeeded; possibly the judges made allowance for popular prejudice; at all events, Aspasia was acquitted and restored to society. She lived to be the delight of a flour merchant, under whose roof her lectures on philosophy were continued with undiminished success to the day of her death.[54] Her friend, and the inheritor of her mantle, Hipparchia, led an equally remarkable life. She was an Athenian by birth, and of good family, but, having heard the Cynic Crates speak, she declared to her parents that nothing would restrain her from yielding herself to him. She kept her word, and became the philosopher's mistress, in spite of his dirt, his poverty, and his grossness. She is reported to have acquired great reputation as a practical professor of the cynic philosophy. Having engaged one day in a fierce discussion with a somewhat brutal philosopher of a rival sect, the latter, by way of answer to a question she put, violently exposed her person before the whole assembly. "Well," said she, coolly, "what does that prove?" This woman was one of the most voluminous and esteemed authors of her day.[55]