  This political conservatism, which was partly motivated by Pascal's experience of wars and partly by his theory of corrupt human nature, is reflected in his claim that “the worst evil of all is civil war” (Fragment 87: II, 569). In the Provincial Letters, he directs readers to the moral teaching of the Gospels to guide them in political action. “The Church … has always taught her children not to render evil for evil … to obey magistrates and superiors, even those who are unjust, because we must always respect in them the power of God who has set them over us” (I, 744). This compulsory tolerance of the status quo, for the sake of the common good, did not preclude comparative assessments of the merits or otherwise of different political systems. However, even in such assessments, the criterion applied by Pascal remained narrowly and theologically focused on the extent to which political arrangements facilitated citizens in the performance of their primary duties to God.