The Proletariat of God

Copy of an Imperial Letter of Constantine to a local governor, after the legalization of Christianity

Since there is a lot of evidence that it appears that devaluing divine worship...has brought great danger on public affairs, and that its lawful restoration and preservation have given the greatest good fortune to the Roman name and singular prosperity on all the affairs of mankind...it has seemed good that those men who, with due holiness and constant observance of this law, give their services on the performance of divine worship [bishops], should receive the rewards of their own labors. So it is my wish that those persons who, within the province committed to you, in the Catholic Church over which Caecilian presides [at Carthage], give their service on this holy worship--those whom they are accustomed to call clerics--should once for all be kept absolutely free from all the public offices, that they be not drawn away by any error or sacrilegious fault from the worship which they owe to the Divinity, but rather without any hindrance serve to the utmost their own law. For when they render supreme service to the Deity, it seems that they confer incalculable benefit on the affairs of the State."

The English translation is a little hard to follow, but Constantine is relieving all bishops from also being ask to fill public offices because such responsibilities would cause them to shirk their duties as ministers.