"Maxwell succeeded in casting all known electromagnetic effects into a mathematical form that has endured to this day... known as Maxwell's field equations. Based on Faraday's earlier work, Maxwell stressed the notion of fields, in contrast to Newton's emphasis on the direct action of bodies on each other across empty space ('). Faraday and Maxwell regarded the effect on an electrically charged body as giving rise to stresses in its immediate surroundings. These in turn produce stresses in ever widening circles, gradually diminishing... These stresses... thought of as capable of existence in otherwise empty space, are called fields... intermediaries between material particles and which assume the burden of Newton's action at a distance."