Jason FosterMr. SparlingEnglish May 45, 2014Hard Times by Sissy and LouisaCharles Dickens is a story that covers many different themes. Dickens uses different characters to express different themes, and two of these characters are Louisa Gradgrind and Sissy Jupe. They are polar opposites of each other and Dickens creates them this way with the purpose of expressing the effects that different ways of interpreting and living life will have on a person. Sissy and Louisa are similar in only a few simple ways, but it is their differences that completely change the characters. The way they were raised drastically affects their worldview. Louisa is Gradgrind's daughter and both she and her brother were used by their father as test subjects. The ideology they grew up on is total utilitarianism; there is nothing important other than facts and statistics. There is no room for emotions or imagination because they are useless and pollute the mind. “A fundamental principle of the Gradgrind philosophy was that everything was paid for. No one should ever, for any reason, give anything to anyone or provide help to anyone without compensation. Gratitude had to be abolished and the virtues that flowed from it no longer had to exist. Every inch of humanity's existence, from birth to death, had to be an over-the-counter affair. And if we didn't get to Heaven that way, it wasn't a political-economic place and we had no business there." (255) This mindset is responsible for her entering a marriage where there is no love, and she almost has an affair. “I haven't done worse, I haven't dishonored you. But if you ask me if I loved him, or do love him, I tell you plainly, father, that it may be... middle of paper... Rby and Harthouse. “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another” (Proverbs 27:17) Sissy eventually gets her children and her husband while Louisa only manages to do a bit of nannying for Sissy's children, having no never had children herself. Dickens' point is that it is better to be in touch with human beings and feel emotions and let your imagination run wild. We are humans, not robots. Emotion and imagination are a gift from God and through them we can also help and bless others. However, if you only care about the facts and statistics of the world, your life is no better than a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. Fortunately, as we saw with Louisa and Sissy, opposites often attract and balance each other out. Works Cited The Holy Bible. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005. Print.Dickens, Charles. Hard times. SI: Sn, 2009. Print. Works cited