what would you do if you have to choose between proffesional ethics & principles

This is an interesting question actually and every situation where the each side has arguments for and against it is going to by a touch decision. Personally I would never sacrifice my principles for professional ethics and thats because your work and how you conduct yourself professionally is only a means to an end and your principles are the things that define you throughout your life so its pretty clear to me which one is going to be more important. Not only this but since your principles are more or less for you to decide and ethics are going to be defined by factors outside of your control they are destined to clash, this means that professional ethics are always going to challenge your principles. There are of course exceptions when they don't collide but those are everyday situations where you never think about, you go to work and are expected to be on time (as a work ethic) and since its not likely to go against your principles there is no conflict. An example I would use to show the clashes would be if I was asked to lie to a customer under the direction of a company I was working for and that it was expected of me to do this as a part of my job. This goes against my principles and I would have no trouble quitting, of course if it was a really good job apart from that fact I might be kind of angry it had to be ruined but in the long run it wouldn't bother me. If I had to stayed and lied to customers as instructed what kind of person would that make me, someone who lies to get ahead professionally, someone who will throw away what they believe because they are told to?