Verse 3. — Shall windy words have any end? 3. Sound words are sometimes windy on account of the pride of those who utter them. The mourner is not to be rebuked. — For windy words are those which serve temporal inflation rather than rectitude. Often the wicked speak even good things; but because they do not speak them well, they utter windy words. For their sayings, even if at times they are sound in their meaning, are nevertheless inflated by pride. But in this, that it was said: You are all burdensome comforters — what else are we taught by the instruction of blessed Job, than that each one should know how carefully to weigh lest in the time of grief he bring in words of rebuke?
For if there are certain things which ought by right to be rebuked, in a time of affliction they are to be postponed, lest the comforter, by rebuking, increase the sorrow which he had proposed to alleviate. There follows: