In 1760 he was appointed as an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Frankfurt (Oder), where he wrote his most well-known work Vom Tode für's Vaterland (1761).
His work was an early attempt to create a space in which it became possible for individuals to think, talk, and act in reference to a larger socio-political whole.
[3] A lot of Abbt's work was an attempt to get the public life in the German society to act more for the good of the country, where he tries to motivate the people that anyone can be great.
As he was concerned between the human heart and social utility, Abbt continued his word and his patriotism had a way to a fairly wide range of philosophy.
[3] He argued that patriotism in modern monarchies could be grounded in an aesthetic passion of enthusiasm generated through sensuous examples of great virtue.
His vision of the informal public sphere existing more or less independently of government based on natural, human impulses, resonates with Shaftesbury in this regard.
It is hard to pick up certain points in his writing, as explained, but Abbt makes connections by numerous rhetorical flourishes and examples drawn from history within social orders in monarchical society, reorienting citizenship around a political virtue.
[3] In the early 1760s Abbt and Moses Mendelssohn had been engaged in a translation of Shaftesbury, as they express their interest in the "public" as the measure of all "true" virtue.
Alexander Pope has an impact on Abbt through his visions of world and society as an ordered whole, which helped influence him to write "On Dying for the Fatherland".
[3] Between Abbt's two famous works of "On Dying for the Fatherland (1761) and "On Merit" (1765), he tries to "overcome the basic German problem of a fragmented public sphere with enlightened argument designed to lead readers to locate themselves and their well-being in an enlarged societal frame.
This war had a large impact on Abbt, as it occurred while he made his most famous wiritngs, and was a present event for a quarter of his lifetime.
The Seven Years' War was also an event that influenced Abbt's writing, especially "On Dying for the Fatherland", which is why he discusses protecting your homeland so much, along with encouraging people to take action in making positive impacts.
He wanted to bring his readers to a sense of their place or role in the larger societal whole, by inspiring virtuous action based.
After writing it, he came into contact with Aufklärer and Moses Mendelssohn, who asked him to become a regular contributor to the "letters concerning the newest literature".
In accepting this offer, Abbt's work became more public and often more present to readers eyes, where he could have easier access in influencing people.
The Margrave of Schaumburg-Lippe caused Abbt to be interred, with great pomp, in his private chapel, and honoured his tomb by an affecting epitaph from his own pen.
[5] In Abbt's life he rose to the top of German academics at such a young age which moved to a position of enlightened administration and free scholarly activity.