Aids to Morality.--"Many imagine that the only ways in which public and private morality can be improved," says the Philadelphia _Ledger_, "are those definite and direct methods which appeal at once to the conscience and the heart. Preaching and teaching, persuading and warning, exhorting and encouraging, are instrumentalities worthy of all honor, and those whose abilities qualify them for such tasks should receive every possible stimulus to exert them in so noble a cause. But it is a great mistake to suppose that these are the only means to promote morality. Every truly civilizing influence is also a reforming one. By this we do not mean that miscalled civilization which multiplies wants, and increases luxury and develops refinement in a few, at the expense of the many, but that advancement of mind and of knowledge, which is forever disclosing better methods of living and diffusing them among the whole people. Dr. Howard Crosby, president of the Society for the Prevention of Crime, in New York, and who has had wide opportunities of observing the condition of morality in that city, has recently declared that the moral condition of New York has vastly improved during the past few years, and that fifty years ago, although there was far less of the foreign element than there is now, a low condition of morality existed that would not be tolerated at the present time. What is true of New York in this respect is equally true of our other cities, and if there be any pessimist who points to the well-known corruptions and vices which still exist as a refutation of this statement, we would remind him that the very fact that such things are now brought to the light, discussed, and condemned, is a proof that they are on the decline. When a community is deeply sunk in immorality, little or no comment is made on the fact. When we come to seek into the causes of this improvement, we shall find that among the most prominent are the practical results of scientific progress and the civilizing tendencies of the age. There is no question that dirt, disease, and darkness are prevalent sources of vice and crime, and whatever influences are brought to bear against them will also press heavily against immorality. The increasing value set upon health, as shown alike in sanitary laws and regulations and in the greater willingness manifested by the community to understand and adopt hygienic modes of life, is beyond dispute. The improvements in house building and drainage; the introduction of water, pure and plentiful; the freer admission of fresh air; the better systems of ventilation; the brilliant lighting up of our city streets--all contribute to the prevention of crime and to the spread of a higher type of morality, while increasing the health, peace, and comfort of the community. And when to all these we add the better and wider education given to the rising generation than was thought possible fifty years ago, we shall