This paper reproduces part of a lecture which I delivered in July to the students attending the special course for foreign lawyers in the University of Cambridge. Its theme was a consideration of Montesquieu's theory of the separation of powers in the British Constitution illustrated by the position of the Lord Chancellor. Being addressed to foreign students, it was largely elementary in character. But some of those who heard it thought that parts of it had a more permanent value. This is an attempt to adapt it so as to render it more suitable for The Cambridge Law Journal.