The thing I find most interesting about Maxwell's Equations is that they can be derived from Coulomb's Law (which gives the force two charges exert on each other), Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity, and a few highly-plausible assumptions (actually I only remember one from when I worked through this--that total electric charge is an invariant. Hardly an assumption!).
So how can it be that all those crazy equations above can be derived from Coulomb's Law. It would take a great deal of my time to work this out in detail--I can point to a book by Melvin Schwartz entitled Principles of Electrodynamics for some guidance, but I recall that his analysis was incomplete. The basic idea is this. Charge and potential are relativistically four-vectors: electric charge is coupled with three vectorial current components and electric potential is coupled with the three vectorial components of magnetic potential. For analysis on this, see a book on relativity (I recommend Gabriel Bergmann's Theory of Relativity). As an example of what I'm talking about, think about how the Lorentz Force between two idle charges would look if you started moving relative to the idle charges. Think about dV/dx--how does it change? Notice how dx's become dt's! and V's become magnetic vectorial components. You get forces like dB/dt! This is really fascinating if you work through it but I have to go back to work. I might come back and work through this but if you're interested, do it yourself--it's rewarding.
Some quick thoughts. Einstein developed relativity after Maxwell's Equations were developed. But relativity could have been developed simply based on analysis of light and its invariant speed, not knowing that light was an electromagnetic wave. From that, from charge conservation, and from Coulomb's Law, Maxwell's Equations could have been developed. Imagine the joy of intentionally discovering Faraday's Law, and even Ampere's Law intentionally.