What does 'words also and thought as rapid as air' mean in Antigone?

This is basically an extended metaphor explaining how man has been able to use intelligence and ingenuity to protect himself against the natural elements like weather.

"Words also, and thought as rapid as air, He fashions to his good use; statecraft is his, And his the skill that deflect the arrows of snow, The spears of winter rain: from every wind He has made himself secure––from all but one: In the late wind of death he cannot stand."