AC 5508 - Accidental? Or Providence?

AC 5508 [2-3, 5]

. . . everything that befalls or happens,
which in other words is called accidental,
and is ascribed to chance or fortune,
is of providence.
Divine providence works in this way
invisibly and incomprehensibly in order
that a person may in freedom
ascribe an event either to providence or to chance;
for if providence acted visibly and comprehensibly,
there would be danger of a person's believing,
from what he sees and comprehends,
that it is of providence,
and afterward changing into the contrary.
In this way truth and falsity
would be conjoined in the interior person,
and truth would be profaned,
which profanation is attended with eternal damnation.
Therefore it is better for such a person
to be kept in unbelief than to be in faith
and then recede from it.

This is what is meant in Isaiah:

Say to this people,
Be ever hearing, but never understanding,
be ever seeing, but never perceiving.
Make the heart of this people calloused;
make their eyes dull and close their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
hear with their ears, understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.
(Isaiah 6:9-10; John 12:40).

It is for this reason also
that miracles are not performed at this day,
for these, like all visible and comprehensible things,
would compel people to believe,
and whatever compels takes away freedom;
when yet all the reformation and regeneration of a person
is effected in his freedom.
That which is not implanted in freedom does not stay.
It is implanted in freedom
when the person is in the affection of good and truth.

That a person at this day
ought to believe what he does not see,
is evident from the Lord's words to Thomas, in John:

Because you have seen Me, Thomas,
you have believed:
blessed are they who do not see,
and yet believe.
(John 20:29)

That the things which happen
(in other words which are ascribed to chance or fortune)
are of the Divine providence,
the church indeed acknowledges,
but still does not believe;
for who does not say,
when apparently by chance
he comes out of some great peril,
that he has been preserved by God,
and also gives God thanks?
And likewise when he is exalted to honors,
and also when he becomes wealthy,
he calls it a blessing from God.
Thus the person of the church acknowledges
that what happens is of providence,
but still does not believe.
But on this subject,
of the Lord's Divine mercy more will be said elsewhere.