2 Peter 2:4

If God spared not the Angels, &c. St. Peter here brings these examples of God's justice. 1. Towards the rebellious angels that fell from heaven; 2. that of the general flood, or deluge; 3. when he destroyed Sodom and those other cities. First, angels that sinned, God by his justice delivered them, drawn down with infernal ropes into hell to be tormented, and to be reserved even for greater torments after the day of judgment. This seems to be the liberal sense of this fourth verse, which is obscure, and has divers reading in the Greek. In the examples of the deluge and of Sodom, St. Peter shews not only the severity of God's judgments upon the wicked, but also his merciful providence towards the small number of the just, as towards Noe [Noah], a preacher of justice, the eighth and chief of those that were preserved in the ark, when he spared not the world that was of old, (literally, the original world) or wicked of those ancient times. When he delivered that just man, Lot, at the time he reduced Sodom and those other cities to ashes: for Lot was just both in sight and hearing, without being corrupted by what he saw and heard; chaste as to his eyes and ears, or as to all that could be seen or heard of him, when the wicked among whom he lived vexed and grieved his just soul by their impious deeds. God, therefore, who knows and approves the ways of the godly, preserves them by his providence amidst temptations. (Witham)

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Rudentibus inferni detractos in tartarum tradidit cruciandos, in judicium reservari, Greek: seirais zophou (some few copies, Greek: adou) Greek: tartarosas, paredoken eis krisin teteremenous; other manuscripts, Greek: teroumenous. Greek: Tartaroo must signify cast into a place, called Greek: tartaros, derived from Greek: taratto, turbo. The Rhem. Testament hath, with ropes of hell drawn down; but the sense rather seems to be, delivered into chains, or into prison. Some would have Greek: tartarosas to signify, cast down into this region of the air. It is true divers of the ancient Fathers were of opinion, that devils are dispersed in the airy region, where they are punished and tormented; but these same Fathers do not deny, that there is in the inferior parts of the earth a place of torments for the devils and damned souls, into which (called also the abyss) the devils begged not to be sent and confined there. (Luke viii. 31.) This is the place called hell, tartarus, &c.