Las Casas found little sympathy from his brother prelates, Bishop Marroquin, as has already been shown, entertaining a bitter dislike toward him. Indeed, the apostle of the Indies was in some respects ill-fitted for the noble work to which he had devoted his life, his impetuous fearless character and ardent zeal blinding his judgment and making him impatient of opposition and heedless of the rights of others. Thus he made enemies where the interests of his cause demanded friends and active supporters. Few if any of the prominent ecclesiastics in the New World viewed the question of slavery as he regarded it, and they resented his unqualified condemnation of it as a reflection on their learning and piety. Under these circumstances it is not strange that, as before stated, his appeals to the audiencia were disregarded and that, meeting only with rebuffs, he departed in disgust for his diocese. In the mean time the settlers of Ciudad Real had by their importunities driven the vicar general of Las Casas from the city. The bishop was not disposed, however, to renew the struggle. His faith in the efficacy of the new laws had received a severe shock, for by this time he had heard of the determined resistance to them throughout the provinces. He had expected that they would be opposed, but not to this extent, and now there was no mistaking the hostile attitude of the settlers. Over the turbulent inhabitants of Ciudad Real he had no further desire to rule, and had already for the third time asked the emperor to allow him to be transferred to Vera Paz, and that bishops be appointed for the provinces of Soconusco, Chiapas, and Yucatan.[XIX‑20] No further troubles appear to have occurred between the bishop and the colonists.[XIX‑21] [Sidenote: REVOCATION OF THE NEW LAWS.] In 1547 Las Casas embarked for Spain. The revocation of the new laws of which he must have heard before his departure, was a death-blow to his hopes in the new world. During the first two years after his arrival his efforts in behalf of the natives appear to have produced nothing more than a few decrees, comparatively unimportant. Later he resigned his bishopric, and retired to the college of San Gregorio de Valladolid, still continuing, however, to take an active interest in Indian affairs, although he had already passed his seventy-fifth year. From this retreat he soon issued to defend the principles which it had been his life-long labor to maintain.